TREATMENT OF UREMIA AFTER ACUTE RENAL FAILURE BY PERITONEAL IRRIGATION

Abstract

Uremia resulting from acute renal damage is frequently fatal, because the renal lesion requires more time for healing than the lethal effects of the uremia will permit. Such potentially reversible renal lesions include those resulting from incompatible transfusions, sulfonamide toxicity, massive trauma, suppression of kidney function following surgical trauma to the urinary tract, toxemia of pregnancy, mercury poisoning and certain forms of acute glomerulonephritis. Available methods do not provide for sufficient excretion of retained substances by extrarenal pathways. Clearance of the circulating blood through an artificial dialyzing membrane is one of the recent methods advocated. But the technical difficulties involved, the need of adequate heparinization and the additional vascular load such a method imposes a're serious handicaps to the acceptance of this method. The use of the peritoneum as a dialyzing membrane for extrarenal excretion is not new. Efforts to utilize this structure to treat uremia have been made in