Can you use Extranial once or twice a day for effective manual dialysis, or must you do three or four exchanges to have effective dialysis?
Hey Rhona, the answer to your question is going to really depend on how much treatment is needed, how much treatment the patient is willing to do, how the patient expects to feel, etc. Some prescribers start low (“incremental”) with less exchanges than standard (which would be 4). I have absolutely heard of incremental PD prescriptions that use Extraneal for a long dwell-- sometimes as the only dialysis until more is needed. Others have prescriptions with other variations. I know there have been attempts at trying a twice daily Extraneal, but it’s still not common practice or recommended.
I asked the same question to my team I am fairly new to PD so they said my prescription will be looked at after I do a test to see what it should be so talk to your team if you did the test and it is the script you need then go by that if not do the test to see what the script is that is best for you I was told it takes 5-6 hours they usually do it 3 months after you start PD then you’ll know your script that is helpful for your health
Good Luck!
The test that they will do is called a peritoneal equilibration test and it’s referred to as the PET for obvious reasons. Here’s an article that describes the PET, how it’s done, and how the results affect what type of PD is best for you. The Peritoneal Equilibration Test for Peritoneal Dialysis - Home Dialysis Central