Home Dialysis News

Jose A. Diaz-Buxo, MD, a key advocate of peritoneal dialysis who had a hand in finetuning the technology for continuous cycling PD in its early days, is stepping down as chief medical officer of Fresenius Medical Care North America’s Renal Therapies Group, effective May 31. Robert Kossmann, MD, a nephrologist from Sante Fe, New Mexico, will replace Diaz-Buxo as CMO and senior vice president.

Dialysis provider Renal Ventures Management has recently opened the Renal Center of Englewood, LLC in Englewood, N.J. The center, which serves peritoneal dialysis patients managing their care at home, is the first stand-alone PD-only center in the state.

To help address a shortage of saline used in dialysis clinics and hospitals, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said that it would allow Fresenius Kabi USA, LLC to temporarily distribute normal saline in the United States from its Norway manufacturing facility.

If you look at the work of nephrologist Stanley Shaldon, who passed away last November at age 82 in Monaco, and Richard Berkowitz, a home hemodialysis patient and founder of the fledging group Home Dialyzors United who died last month at age 67, you see some similarities. Both pushed the idea that patients could dialyze at home and lead a normal life.

Baxter International Inc. announced this week that it will create two separate, independent global health care companies to sell its products––one for biopharmaceuticals and the other for medical products. 

Kathe LeBeau, 55, a home hemodialysis patient from Latham, N.Y. who has campaigned on Capitol Hill and among patient and professional organizations to push for more home dialysis, died Monday night from complications due to a pulmonary embolism.

Stanley Shaldon, one of the English pioneers of hemodialysis for chronic kidney failure, died on Nov. 20, 2013 in Monaco at the age of 82.

Fresenius Medical Care North America had to notify customers of leakage from its Optiflux dialyzers. Model numbers ranged from the F160NRe to the F18Nre in the series; six models total. The company said it had notified customers in February that, in some cases, the dialysate port caps on the hemodialyzer do not form a tight seal when normal torque is applied, “and we advised them that if they encounter a resulting saline leak during pre-treatment priming, they should secure the cap beyond the thread stop,” FMCNA spokesperson Jonathan Stone told NN&I. The FDA recall classification does not involve removing any products from the market, said Stone.

Baxter International Inc. has initiated a voluntary recall in the United States of a single lot of DIANEAL PD-2 Peritoneal Dialysis Solution with 1.5% Dextrose 6000mL (Ambu-Flex II) to the hospital/user level. The recall is being initiated as a result of complaints of particulate matter, identified as mold, resulting from a leak in the container.

Fifty years ago home hemodialysis (HHD) began in the cities of Boston and Seattle and in London, England. HHD started because its lower cost would enable more patients to be treated, and the many benefits for patients soon became obvious. Six months after the start of the Medicare ESRD Program in 1973, 32.2% of the 10,306 U.S. dialysis patients were on home hemodialysis. Home hemodialysis as a percentage of all dialysis patients declined steadily after that for many reasons, reaching a low of 0.57% of the dialysis population in 2002. Since then it has gradually increased and by 2011 had grown to 1.3%. At that time 11 other countries had a higher percentage of patients on home hemodialysis, ranging from 1.5% in Hong Kong to 18.2% in New Zealand.