Usefulness of Peritoneal Dialysis (PD) in Patients with Refractory Heart Failure (RHF)

Yoo, Dong Eun; Kim, Seung Jun; Park, Sun Young; Oh, Hyung Jung; Lee, Han Sung; Lee, Jeung Eun; Choi, Hoon Young; Han, Seung Hyeok; Han, Dae Suk; Kang, Shin Wook

Abstract

BACKGROUND
Though PD has served as a treatment method for metabolic derangement in acute or chronic renal failure, it has also been used as a palliative therapy or as a bridge to definite surgery or transplantation in patients with RHF. Some studies have demonstrated that PD reduced hospitalization rates and improved functional capacity in these patients, but changes in echocardiographic findings after PD have not been thoroughly explored. In this study, the effects of PD on hospitalization rates and days, functional status, and echocardiographic parameters were evaluated.
METHODS
Thirteen patients, in whom PD was performed to treat heart failure, were enrolled. Patients with serum creatinine levels more than 3.0 mg/dL and with acute cardiac event within 1 month before the start of PD were excluded. The clinical, laboratory, and echocardiographic findings before and after the start of PD were compared by carrying out a paired t-test or Wilcoxon signed rank test.
RESULTS
Among 13 patients, 11 patients experienced improvement in functional status after the initiation of PD, and the mean NYHA class improved from 3.5+/-0.5 to 2.3+/-0.9 after PD treatment (p<0.005). Significant reductions in hospitalization rates (from 1.7+/-0.4 to 0.2+/-0.4 episodes/patient-year, p<0.001) and in hospitalization days (from 62.1+/-26.5 to 3.8+/-8.9 days/patient-year, p<0.001) were also observed since the start of PD. Echocardiographic findings revealed that right ventricular pressure was significantly reduced in both right-sided and left-sided heart failure patients (p<0.05), whereas there were no significant changes in left ventricular end-diastolic diameter and left ventricular ejection fraction after PD therapy.
CONCLUSION
PD treatment improved quality of life, shortened hospitalization period, and reduced right ventricular pressure in patients with RHF. These findings suggest that PD should be considered as an alternative therapeutic modality for RHF.