Risk factors responsible for peritonitis associated with peritoneal dialysis (CAPD/APD)

Peritoneal dialysis (PD) is one of renal replacement therapies for patients with end-stage renal disease. Peritonitis is almost the most frequent complication of PD, It is also known as the most frequent cause of hospitalization among these patients. Although the frequency of peritonitis has decreased as a result of the evolutions in both therapy and technology of PD, it still remains to be a vital problem. The attacks of peritonitis on PD patients are also the most important determining factor of mortality-morbidity and technical survival among PD patients, therefore (knowledge of risk factors play a role in the development of peritonitis, and therefore must be corrected). In this study, we aimed to identify risk factors responsible for peritonitis associated with PD among patients in Karadeniz Technical University, school of medicine, department of nephrology.Forty peritoneal dialysis patients who were followed by Peritoneal Dialysis Unit in KTU Medical Faculty Nephrology Department, between 2006 and 2010 were included into our study. The patients? demographic, clinical and laboratory parameters were recorded. The patients were divided into two main categories: patients without peritonitis (patients who never had peritonitis) and patients with peritonitis (patients with at least one episode of peritonitis). Baseline comparisons between these groups were made using chi-square analysis and Student t-test for categorical and continuous variables, respectively. Over a total of 1379 patient-months, 31 episodes of peritonitis on 21 patients were observed. The average of peritonitis rate was 44 month/ atack. In this study, we detected that low serum albumin level, low educational level, smoking, psychosocial impairment, hyponatremia, hypocalcemia, hypophosphatemia and decrease in residual renal function increase the risk of peritonitis among PD patients. İn addition, we found that serum white blood cell and CRP is significantly higher on patients with peritonitis.As a result, necessary measures should be taken for prevention of peritonitis at every stage of peritoneal dialysis treatment in order to continue health and quality of life of our patients.