Researchers Develop Small Dialysis Machine for Newborns with Kidney Injuries

Researchers have developed and tested a small dialysis machine for newborns suffering from multiple organ failure.

Researchers said that the device - CARPEDIEM (Cardio-Renal Pediatric Dialysis Emergency Machine) - could help save lives of children with kidney injuries. Currently, doctors have to rely on dialysis machines designed for adult patients and modify it to use in children and babies.

"Such modifications make adult devices inaccurate (when used in infants lighter than 15kg) and can result in complications with fluid management and treatment delivery," explained lead author Professor Claudio Ronco from San Bortolo Hospital in Vicenza, Italy.

"A major problem is the potential for errors in ultra-filtration volumes - adult dialysis equipment has a tendency to either withdraw too much fluid from a child - leading to dehydration and loss of blood pressure or too little fluid leading to high blood pressure and edema," Ronco said in a news release.

Around 18 percent of low birth-weight babies and 20 percent of all children admitted in the Intensive Care Unit suffer from acute kidney injury or kidney failure, Medical News Today reported. The new miniaturized dialysis machine could offer doctors with more options in treating these patients.

The device is a new continuous renal replacement therapy (CRRT) and is designed to be used in patients who weigh between 2kg and 10kg. CARPDIEM can handle ultra-low filtration flow and allows usage of a small catheter that doesn't damage the organs of the babies.

In August 2013, CARPEDIEM was used to treat a newborn baby weighing just 2.9kg. The baby was born via a complicated delivery and had multiple organ failure. Doctors kept the baby on the dialysis machine for 20 days. Organ function was restored in the baby and it was discharged 50 days later.

"The child survived the neonatal period, an outcome that would have been less likely just several years ago, without the new machine or improvements in overall neonatal care," said Benjamin Laskin d Bethany Foster - from The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia in the USA and the Montreal Children's Hospital in Canada, respectively - in linked commentary .

They added that more research is required to assess the efficacy and safety of the new device.

The study is published in the journal The Lancet.