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Hugh H. Hussey, MD

JAMA. 1975;232(11):1156.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

As experience with long-term hemodialysis for patients with end-stage kidney disease has enlarged, rather strange complications have developed in some patients. An earlier editorial in THE JOURNAL (230:1680, 1974) described a group of patients in whom cachexia, ascites, and severe hypertension appeared and the last was intensified during episodes of treatment. All patients died except those who underwent bilateral nephrectomy, in which case ascites disappeared, hypertension subsided, and weight was restored.

In the current issue of Archives of Internal Medicine (135:807-810, 1975), Minuth et al give an account of their experience with patients who developed pericarditis— another mysterious complication. Of course, uremic pericarditis was well known before the advent of hemodialysis and signaled that death was near. Now, for patients receiving long-term hemodialysis, the onset of pericarditis, although not so ominous, is nevertheless serious, especially when it causes cardiac compression.

Various methods of treatment have been used, including increased frequency . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Footnotes
Address editorial communications to the Editor, 535 N Dearborn St, Chicago, IL 60610

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