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Americans have end-stage renal disease, and most are treated with hemodialysis. 1 A major challenge in caring for patients undergoing hemodialysis is maintaining a functioning vascular access, which is essential for performing the dialysis procedure. The effect of vascular access dysfunction is substantial-it is a leading reason for hospitalization among patients with end-stage renal disease and has associated annual costs in the United States that exceed $1 billion. 2,3 For editorial comment see p 2205.Author Affiliations and Members of the Dialysis Access Consortium Study Group are listed at the end of this article.

Although hyponatremia is a common, usually mild, and relatively asymptomatic disorder of electrolytes, acute severe hyponatremia can cause substantial morbidity and mortality, particularly in patients with concomitant disease. In addition, overly rapid correction of chronic hyponatremia can cause severe neurologic deficits and death, and optimal treatment strategies for such cases are not established. Hyponatremia is the most common disorder of electrolytes encountered in clinical practice, occurring in up to 15% to 30% of both acutely and chronically hospitalized patients. 1 Although most cases are mild and relatively asymptomatic, hyponatremia is important clinically because: (1) acute severe hyponatremia can cause substantial morbidity and mortality; (2) mortality is higher in patients with hyponatremia who have a wide range of underlying diseases; and (3) overly rapid correction of chronic hyponatremia can cause severe neurologic deficits and death.Despite knowledge of hyponatremia since the mid-20th century, this common disorder remains incompletely understood in many basic areas because of its association with a plethora of underlying disease states, and its multiple etiologies with differing pathophysiologic mechanisms. 2 Optimal treatment strategies have not been well defined, both for these reasons and because of marked differences in symptomatology and clinical outcomes based on the acuteness or chronicity of the hyponatremia. 3 Vasopressin receptor antagonists have long been anticipated as a more effective method to treat hyponatremia by virtue of their unique aquaretic effect to selectively increase solute-free water excretion by the kidneys. 4 The recent approval of the first such agent, conivaptan, for clinical use by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) heralds the beginning of a new era in the management of hyponatremic disorders. However, effective therapy with these agents will require intelligent guidelines for their use. To this end, a panel of experts in hyponatremia convened to review current therapies for hyponatremia and to evaluate the situations in which aquaretic agents should be considered as alternatives or supplements to accepted current therapies. This review is a summary of the conclusions of this panel.

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