No abstract

We performed 41 cuff-shaving procedures in 38 patients on continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CAPD) with exit-site infection unresponsive to medical treatment. Cuff shaving was performed on three patients with two catheters each. This procedure was effective in eliminating 50% of S. aureus exit-site infection and all S. epidermidis exit-site infection, but was ineffective in Gram-negative exit-site infection. After cuff-shaving procedure, 20 catheters (49%) were removed; 11 for persistent tunnel infection and nine because of development of secondary peritonitis. The probability of catheter survival at 1 year was 50% and remained stable thereafter. Cuff-shaving procedure may be a valuable mode of therapy for treating patients with S. aureus and/or S. epidermidis exit-site infection unresponsive to medical treatment.

No abstract

Gallstone disease was detected in 28% of 119 patients on regular dialysis treatment. The disease was silent in 82% of the patients. Stones were radiolucent in 88% of the cases, radioopaque in 8% and mixed in 4%. Among 49 variables considered, increasing age was the only variable that correlated significantly with increasing prevalence of gallstone disease. Since no relationships were found between gallstones and age or modes of dialysis, it is conceivable that some mechanism(s) linked with the preexisting chronic nephropathy might have been involved in the development of cholelithiasis. End-stage renal disease could be another so far unrecognized risk factor for cholelithiasis.