21 Also, peptidoglycans and DNA fragments may behave similarly. The concept of backfiltration has parallels with the movement of fluids across capillary walls – at the ‘arterial’ end, there is a net movement of fluid from blood to dialysate, whereas the distal or ‘venous’ end may have a net movement of fluid from dialysate to blood, depending on the balance of

blood-side pressure and dialysate pressure. Control of the amount of ultrafiltration Selleckchem Ibrutinib in dialysis can therefore be effected by either raising the ‘venous’ pressure (clamping the venous line) but this may lead to clotting of the circuit; or, as is the case usually, creating a variable negative pressure on the dialysate side by pumping dialysate back to the machine. Especially in situations of small ultrafiltration requirements (small ‘weight gains’) using a highly porous membrane, backfiltration Deforolimus datasheet from dialysate to blood will occur. In this way, contaminants may enter the bloodstream by convective transfer from the dialysate. It is also possible that backdiffusion (i.e. movement down a concentration gradient) may contribute, although most of the concerning contaminants are large and thus convective transfer is more likely. Various in vitro studies have examined endotoxin transfer across dialysis membranes – with varying results. Most evidence would suggest

that the synthetic dialysis membranes, with their thick walls and supportive ‘honeycomb’ BCKDHB are actually quite adsorptive for endotoxins and represent a significant barrier to endotoxin

transfer from dialysate to blood. Indeed, the thin-walled cellulosic membranes may actually present less of a barrier to backfiltration.22,23 Whether there is a difference between various types of synthetic membrane is more speculative, with limited evidence supporting some small differences. This can then be translated to in vivo conditions by examining inflammatory cytokine induction after exposure to different membranes in contaminated circumstances. The evidence again supports less cytokine induction and lower C-reactive protein levels with the synthetic membranes under these conditions.23 However, it is often difficult to separate how much of this inflammatory response is caused by membrane biocompatibility versus (prevention of) backfiltration of bacterial fragments. It is also difficult to translate the (potential) endotoxin fragment exposure into clinical scenarios. Massive exposure might result in an endotoxaemia-type picture, but this is almost unheard of. Acute exposure may result in hypotension, nausea, headache and other symptoms we recognize as relatively common in dialysis – and often blame on volume changes. Prolonged exposure may result not only in the effects of chronic inflammation – especially cachexia (e.g.