kidney transplant part 2

The last time I met the Nephrologist (kidney doctor) he set me with a CAPD assesment to show me what is Hemodialysis (or dialysis in short). It was my first time at the Dialysis department and it gave me shivers.

So I arrived just in time at 3pm and registered. I saw some patients at the CAPD dept going through their daily dialysis process. After waiting for 2-3 minutes the nurse called me and the others that will be in the assessment on that day. She sent us to the seminar room. There was 5 dialysis patients that day accompanied by family members.

I got a clearer picture about what Hemodialysis is. To take over the function of kidney that has failed (renal failure). There are two types of dialysis. Literally translated to english; water wash and blood wash. The blood wash - you have to come to the hospital three times a week at the hospital to be treated by the nurse (if I'm not mistaken). It was not presented to us that day.

What was presented by the nurse was the water wash. The doctor will poke a small hole through your stomach and insert a tube that will be in your stomach until the day you die or change to the other type of dialysis. If it's damaged the docs will do a minor surgery to change the tube. This tube will be used to insert a certain liquid/water to your stomach.

This water wash has also two types which are manual and automatic. The manual one, you have to change the water (15-20 minutes) four times daily; morning afternoon evening and night. The cost of the instruments and bags of water water (120 bags) is RM2600 per month. The patient must have a specific room for dialysis, and cleaned, mopped everyday and more than once a day. It have to be super clean to avoid germs to enter your stomach.

Even if the opening of the tube touched your hand the tiniest bit, you have to go to hospital and change your tube. That's scary. Imagine how life is so hard for hemodialysis patients.

Okay, the other one is the automatic one. You'll have to rent a machine that costs RM4500 per month and the machine will clean the water automatically for 10 hours every single day. So, you can do it at night. 10 pm to 8 am while you sleep. It works like the automatic washing machine. But the cost-Rm4500 per month...that's a lot. The nurse said if you wanna buy the machine it costs about RM40k plus no one had bought it before. Wonder why.