Dialysis at Sea

I’ve heard of cruise ships with dialysis machines before but never did any research. This morning while walking into dialysis, I saw a stack of brochures from Dialysis at Sea. They provide hemodialysis services on select Royal Caribbean and Celebrity cruises using Fresenius 2008K machines. That appears to be a home dialysis machine.

The patient would visit the infirmary for their regular dialysis sessions but would be free to enjoy the rest of the cruise. Sounds like a good idea since there is a lot of time available on a typical cruise, and cruise ships are big.

I do see one issue. The brochure said Medicare does not pay for dialysis aboard cruise ships, and likely neither does private insurance. Medicare covers about 90% of US dialysis patients. To join one of these cruises, the patient will need to pay for the cruise, and pay for dialysis. I’m pretty sure Dialysis at Sea will charge more than the low Medicare reimbursement rates. My dialysis center charges me about $2000 per dialysis session whereas Medicare only pays $260. Using those prices, a 7-day cruise will cost about $6000 more for 3 days of dialysis. I guess this option is mainly for rich old people.

Also, I’ve only been on one cruise to Alaska and didn’t really enjoy it. I was bored out of my mind and there was no internet between ports. Unlike my sister, I don’t like gambling either so I didn’t spent hours of free time in the tiny casino. Looking at the schedule, there are only a few interesting cruises:

• March 20, 2020 – Great Barrier Reef, 12-nights, Sydney to Auckland
• July 18′ 2020 – Scandinavia & St. Petersburg, 14-nights, Southampton
• July 21, 2021 – Spain/Italian Med, 14-nights, Southampton
• August 28, 2020 – Norwegian Fjords, 8-nights, Southampton
• Sept 5, 2020 – Iceland/Ireland, 14-nights, Southampton
• Sept 26, 2021 – Japan, 14-night, Tokyo
• Oct 10, 2021 – Japan/Hong Kong/Vietnam, 13-nights, Tokyo to Singapore
• Nov 8, 2020 – Spain/France/Italy, 12-nights, Barcelona

A lot of these cruises will likely cost an extra $10000+ if the patient can’t get insurance reimbursement. Also, traveling to the cruise from West Coast USA will take an extra day without airline delays. Timing is risky since patients only have about 48 hours between dialysis sessions. Out of all the cruises above, Japan to Singapore is the best sounding one just for the food opportunities alone. From Celebtity’s website, the cost of the cruise, even in a suite, will be cheaper than the dialysis.

Celebrity Cruises

October 2021. I hope I’ve received a kidney transplant by then so I can travel to Asia like a normal person. If not, I’ll probably book this cruise just because there are really no other travel opportunities for hemodialysis patients, and for sure I would have gone insane if I’m still in dialysis 22 months from now.