Marilena G. Koukou, Vassilios E. Smyrniotis, Nikolaos F. Arkadopoulos, Eirini I. Grapsa.
We made an assessment of the situation of Hemodialysis (HD) patients in the period of economic crisis compared to international data through the recording of demographic characteristics. Our sample consists of 2,586 subjects undergoing HD (27% of patients in HD), with the most common cause of endstage renal disease for patients undergoing HD is the “unknown cause” with 33.02%. Similar is the situation in Spain (30.3%), Italy (30.3%), Hungary (41.7%), Poland (25.8%) and Portugal (28.1%). The mean age was determined at 68.7 ± 14.1 years (63.7% men) and 66.3 ± 13.2 years (49.4% men) for the Czech Republic up to 68.9 ± 15 years (58 , 8% men) for France. We noticed that patients with “unknown cause” are fol
lowing an ESRD patient in HD. In their dossier, drugs such as,epoetin alfa, IV iron therary, levocarnitine, vitamins, clopidogrel and hydrochloride. At the same time, there is no mention of another co-existing disease, such as fabry disease, which could have led the patient either to hemodialysis or to cause a worsening of the dementia of patients on hemodialysis. This situation should be of worldwide interest as there are several countries within the European Union but possibly outside of the country where there is no examination of the primary cause of renal insufficiency, with the result that the patient does not have the right treatment even though he is in dialysis.
