Amino acid infusion

Ask Our Experts Dr. John Agar, Nephrologist
1

Importance of Amino acid infusion for gaining dry weight.

After several weeks of loosing weight , I have consulted one of the Nephrologist and he has suggested to follow

  1. Thrice a week Heamodialysis
  2. Take amino acid infusion in last 1 hour of dialysis - start from 250ml and increase it to 500ml and at last 1000ml per session of dialysis.

Usually 250ml infusion is planned in last 1hour of dialysis (Total duration of HD is 4hours in hospital environment)

My question is - How to plan for 500ml and 1000ml of infusion over blood line IV route during dialysis because then drops per minute will need to be increased in multiple folds. If i increased duration to 2hrs or 4hours then the effectiveness of this would be lost due to dialysis itself filtering it out .

I could not reach back to the Nephrologist who has adviced it hence asking here if anyone else has faced the similar situations.

Meanwhile I will try to connect with my local Nephrologist to seek his opinion/suggestion on it.

2

Consulted local Nephrologist, he has told the same that amino acid infusion of 500ml and 1000ml over period of 2 hrs may be ineffective for 2 reasons 1. Out of 4hrs if last 2hrs are planned for putting fluid back in then effective net fluid ultrafiltration goal needs to be up which means weakness on the body 2. Last 2hrs period itself means this amino acid is again getting filtered out than staying it.

He has recommended a amino acid injection over 100ml of NS once per week while insisting that primary source to gain weight should come from food based protein intake. As per her current dry weight 39kg minimum 60gm of protein should be tried per day. It can come from various plant or animal based protein except red meat.