The need for outpatient back-up for home hemodialysis patients: Implications for resource utilization.

Introduction: The provision of sufficient support contributes to home hemodialysis (HHD) technique survival. The need for back-up treatment in incident and prevalent patients on HHD has not been well described previously, and is important from both technique survival and resource allocation. We aimed to quantify the amount of back-up treatment given to patients in our HHD unit, and hypothesized that the provision of back-up HD facilitated technique survival.

A prototype line clamp for venous access bleeding in hemodialysis: A prospective cohort study.

Introduction: Venous needle dislodgement (or venous port disconnection) during hemodialysis (HD) may lead to catastrophic blood loss, particularly during unsupervised home HD. A prototype venous line clamp was developed for use in conjunction with the Redsense blood loss sensor. We hypothesize that this prototype device will provide additional safety to dialysis without excessive burden.

The use of nurse-administered vascular access audit in home hemodialysis patients: A quality initiative.

Introduction: Vascular access complications are associated with increased morbidity and mortality in home hemodialysis (HHD). Nurse-administered vascular access checklist is a feasible quality improvement strategy aimed to lower HHD access errors.

Methods: We conducted a prospective quality improvement initiative for consecutive HHD patients between April 2013 and December 2016 at the Toronto General Hospital.