The human kidneys are not immune from damage. And when they are damaged and stop functioning, those toxins like urea stop being removed from the body, leading to death. There are two ways we can deal with this problem, the first being dialysis. The machine used in dialysis is called the dialysis machine, and relies on a process called dialysis to clean the blood.
A person’s blood leaves their body and flows into the machine, through partially permeable membranes. After the membranes comes the dialysis fluid, which contains a certain concentration of substances to ensure diffusion of unwanted substances from the blood into the fluid. However, glucose remains in the blood.
The dialysis machine prevents unwanted substances from building up and restores them to normal levels, so the patient can live a normal life – but they will build up again after a couple of days, which means regular dialysis must be done, which sometimes means dialysis machines are fitted in the patients’ homes. They have to remain attached to the machine for about eight hours each time.
But it is essential the patient does not lose vital substances from the blood like glucose and important mineral ions. The way this is done is by having the dialysis fluid at exactly the right concentration so there is no net movement of glucose and mineral ions from blood plasma out into the fluid. It also contains the normal content of mineral ions, so that any excess mineral ions are lost by diffusion, but no more.
There is no urea in the dialysis fluid, so there is a very strong concentration gradient for the urea – so it simply leaves the blood in its entirity.
Disadvantages of these machines include:
repeated use at 8 hours per use
must also follow a strict, healthy diet
after some years, the levels can be hard to maintain
These are some notes on dialysis machine hope you like them.
