Okay, today was a blood letting for sure. The arterial needle started bleeding about 30 minutes into the session. I was looking at my iPad so I didn’t notice until there was a nice pool of blood under my arm. The tech came by to clean up a bit and replace the tape holding the needle. Not after 20 minutes, it started bleeding again, soaking through all the tape and bandage. She changed me again and this time it held until the end of the session. At lease I’m not squeamish about blood; that would suck for a dialysis technician.
I think dialysis is barely working for me. I’m still at four hours each session which appears to be the longest of any patient at the center. The last set of labs had my URR at 68.1%. The value needs to be at least 65% and they increase my time when I don’t hit the goal. I think since I’m over, they should be able to reduce the time. We know that peritoneal dialysis doesn’t work for me at all. I guess the last thing to try is home hemodialysis but I (or my caretaker) would have to be able to stick the needles in my fistula consistently. I don’t know if they can put another chest catheter in the same spot since they inserted and removed two catheters there already. I guess the reality is that the fistula has to work since I am running out of options for dialysis.
Life with chronic diseases 