Biofiltration in elderly uremic patients.

Abstract

We treated five elderly patients with conventional hemodialysis (CH) or biofiltration (BF) to establish whether their dialytic tolerance was better. For three patients treatment time was reduced from twelve to nine hours a week; for the other two, treatment time remained unchanged (10.5-12 h/week) because of their high interdialytic weight gain. At the beginning and end of the study, clinical status, biochemical data, nutritional status and acid-base balance (ABB) were checked. Plasma levels of small molecules, potassium and phosphate were unchanged for all patients. All had a lower number of episodes or less severe hypotension and good control of ABB. No patients had metabolic alkalosis or worsened nutritional status. For all patients BF was an efficacious choice compared to CH, giving them good health.