If someone you love suffers from kidney disease, then you have likely been informed that they may need dialysis treatments in the future. However, you may still have many questions about the dialysis process that you would like the answers to so that you can prepare to help them with their potential dialysis treatments.

Read on to learn more about dialysis, including why it is such an important treatment for kidney disease, dialysis types, and more.

How Dialysis Helps Kidney Disease Sufferers

Dialysis is typically needed when a person has lost about 85 to 90 percent of their kidney function due to end-stage kidney failure. The dialysis process removes the waste products, along with excess sodium and water, that healthy kidneys typically remove from a person's bloodstream before they build up to a dangerous level.

Removal of these substances is very important for the health of a kidney disease sufferer.

Dialysis Types

Many people who have never needed dialysis treatments do not know that there are two main types of dialysis in use today that both work well.

Hemodialysis

While there are many ways to access a person's bloodstream before beginning a hemodialysis treatment, often, a special tube called a catheter is placed in a vein to access the blood. Then, this catheter is attached to a special dialysis machine that draws blood out of the body, removes waste and extra fluids from it, then returns it to the bloodstream.

Hemodialysis is the type of dialysis that many people with advanced kidney disease have performed in dialysis centers.

However, hemodialysis can now be performed at home with the help of a mobile vascular access service that assigns a healthcare worker to visit the home of a dialysis patient, hook up a catheter, and perform dialysis with the help of a portable dialysis machine.

Peritoneal Dialysis

While there are several subtypes of peritoneal dialysis, all of them filter the waste and fluids from a person's bloodstream with their own stomach lining instead of an external dialysis machine.

An access catheter that remains in place for an extended period must be placed in your stomach before peritoneal dialysis treatments can begin.

Once the area where the catheter is placed heals, a person can begin performing peritoneal dialysis treatments in their own home. To perform a treatment, a person takes a bag filled with a special dialysis fluid and transfers it into their body through the catheter. This solution then stays in place for several hours before it is then drained into another bag.

Both dialysis types work well, and neither is considered a more effective kidney failure treatment than the other.

If you have a loved one who suffers from advanced kidney failure, then now you understand how the dialysis process works. Reach out to a local mobile vascular access service if your loved one would like to obtain hemodialysis treatments in the comfort of their own home instead of in an inconvenient dialysis center.