I got surprised by my weight upon arrival to the dialysis center, I am overweight with extra water than usual so I just asked for my nurses to take off the water that got loaded unto me during the past few days. I am actually having an edema on my feet despite that I am lying down all the time.
The amount of extra water that I wanted to be taken out did not materialize because I am on a "Flushing" system where they are not using a blood thinner that is called "Heparin" because I am just newly operated with my Appendix.
What is "Flushing" in Dialysis?
Flushing is a technique where they flush the build-up of blood with saline solution to the ends of dialyzer so that it won't get clogged-up with blood because the patient is not using Heparin temporarily or permanently for their treatment because of many reasons like if the patient has bleeding issues, just got back from surgeries, ulcers inside the body or gastro-intestinal tract so that the patient won't get the risk of bleeding-out while having a dialysis, etc.
Heparin is a standard in dialysis so that there will be no coagulation of the blood while undergoing dialysis so that there is a free flow of blood through the dialysis membrane of the dialyzer, the blood filter.
Now they just employed the flushing technique on me which affected the amount of water that had to be drawn from my body because it requires saline solution to be added up with the water drawing process. Anyway at least I was able to get a needed relief because my feet are starting to develop edema. I will just try to limit my liquid consumption more because I was not taken-out completely with extra water.
It is easier now to control water consumption because they do not add more sodium in my system which makes me thirsty. I am glut on fluids only if I am thirsty especially when they do that "sodiuming" to me in an attempt to raise my blood pressure. But there is no need to raise my blood pressure because of my Caffeine intake during dialysis.
I am grateful and thankful once again that I am able to complete my dialysis session and get some relief. Tomorrow God-willing I am scheduled to meet my Surgeon for a check-up. All is well with my tummy because it is not hurting anymore thanks be to God.
