Performance of a novel high sensitivity cardiac troponin I assay in asymptomatic hemodialysis patients - evidence for sex-specific differences.

Background High sensitivity assays for the determination of cardiac troponin I (cTnI) are able to reliably measure cTnI far below the 99th percentile of healthy persons (hs-cTnI) and display sex-specific differences. There is uncertainty regarding the clinical utility of hs-cTnI in asymptomatic hemodialysis (HD) patients and if sex-specific differences also apply in this cohort. Methods In this multicenter study we measured hs-cTnI and sensitive cTnI (s-TnI) concentrations (both on Siemens Centaur) in 215 HD patients from a predialytic sample to determine the prevalence of elevated concentrations above the 99th percentile, the association with baseline characteristics, prognostic accuracy for death, and sex-specific differences.

Systemic haemodynamics in haemodialysis: intradialytic changes and prognostic significance.

Background: Although haemodialysis (HD) leads to alterations of systemic haemodynamics that can be monitored using dilution methods, there is a lack of data on the diagnostic and prognostic significance of haemodynamic monitoring during routine HD.

Methods: In this multicentre study, we measured cardiac index (CI), access flow (AF) and central blood volume index (CBVI) during a single HD session in stable HD patients (n = 215) using the Transonic HD03 monitor (Transonic, Ithaca, NY, USA). Systemic CI (SCI) was defined as CI corrected for AF.