[Early kidney transplant failure and return to peritoneal dialysis: preliminary study of permeability and dialysis efficacy].

Unlabelled: The return to dialysis after kidney transplant (TX) failure is increasingly common. On returning to dialysis after TX failure, there is usually a similar or worse clinical situation than in patients who are on haemodialysis or peritoneal dialysis (PD) for the first time. Although there are several studies on the clinical situation of patients who return to PD after long periods with a functioning TX, there is hardly any information on the progression of a patient subgroup returning to PD after TX failure a few days or weeks after transplantation.

Objective: Assess whether a short period of time on suboptimal TX and aggressive treatment/measures may influence membrane permeability, the clinical situation and dialysis efficacy on returning to PD.

Patients And Method: In 9 patients (53.5 ± 15.4 years of age, 5 males and 4 females) who had previously been on PD before early TX failure and had returned to PD (25 ± 23 days, range 10-64) over the last five years, we studied laboratory data including inflammation, nutrition, kidney function, permeability and PD efficacy, at four points during progression: before TX, immediately after returning to PD and after one month and three months on PD.

Results: We did not detect significant differences in the progression of nutrition and inflammation parameters. Diuresis decreased significantly from pre-TX volume to diuresis on return to PD and after one month on PD (p=.032), remaining at low levels after three months on PD. UF decreased from 1407 to 951 ml/day (p=.022) and from 314 to 260 ml/4h (p=.018) in the peritoneal equilibration test after three months on PD, without changes being observed in the creatinine dialysate/plasma ratio. Kt/V and weekly creatinine clearance decreased slightly and remained at adequate efficacy levels.

Conclusions: In this small sample of patients, who returned to PD after early TX failure, it does not appear that the measures involved in managing a graft at risk over a short period of time have a major effect on clinical parameters and permeability or peritoneal efficacy.