What Is Dialysis?
Your kidneys form a critical function in your body. They clean your blood of toxins, allowing you to eliminate those toxins through urination while your blood flows through your system. They also regulate the body’s electrolytes and eliminate excess fluid, among other functions. When your kidneys are not functioning properly, you need a way to clear these toxins from your blood and regulate the body’s electrolytes and fluids in order to stay healthy. The process for cleaning your blood through medical intervention is dialysis.
Why Do People Need Dialysis?
People need dialysis when they have kidney disease that is so severe that the kidneys are not able to do their job. You can usually function with one operative kidney, but if both kidneys have sustained too much damage to function, this process will be necessary to keep you alive.
How Does Treatment Work?
When we speak of dialysis, we are most often speaking of hemodialysis. This is a process for cleaning the blood outside the body. For this process, we hook the patient up to a special machine. Their blood flows through the machine, the machine cleans it and then returns it to the body. To connect the patient to the machine requires dialysis access. This means creating an access point. The most common access point we create is the arteriovenous fistula. The fistula makes it easy to connect the patient to the machine for repeated treatments.
At Surgical Services of Athens, we perform placement of arteriovenous access. This includes placement of new access, revision of access, angiography and stenting to assist with the special needs of renal failure patients.
Dialysis Access in Alabama With Surgical Services of Athens
Dialysis is a serious procedure, and you want your care to come from someone you trust. With over 20 years of experience, Surgical Services of Athens is the practice you can rely on for dialysis access. For arteriovenous access in Athens, Madison, Huntsville and nearby areas in Alabama, fill out our request appointment form below or call us at 256-216-6500.
