Affiliated with St. Cloud Hospital, the dialysis centers of the CentraCare Kidney Program work each day to improve the health and quality of life for those in Central Minnesota in a manner that reflects the healing mission of Jesus. Our program offers the two basic types of dialysis – peritoneal dialysis and hemodialysis.

Types of Dialysis
Kidneys help the body get rid of toxic waste and fluids. When kidneys fail, dialysis or a kidney transplant is needed to prevent death.

Peritoneal Dialysis (PD)
With peritoneal dialysis, the body removes toxic waste and fluids through the peritoneal membrane in your belly. You will need surgery to place a catheter in your belly (dialysis access) before you begin dialysis. The fluids will cycle in and out of the belly through this catheter.

• Continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CAPD) – After you are trained, you can do this dialysis treatment at home. The treatment is done with gravity (no machines needed). The process of doing peritoneal dialysis is called an exchange. You will usually complete 3 to 6 exchanges per day.
• Continuous cycler peritoneal dialysis (CCPD) – After you are trained, you do this dialysis treatment at home. This treatment uses a cycler machine and is done at night while you sleep. The cycler will complete 3 to 6 exchanges per night.
• Acute peritoneal dialysis – St Cloud Hospital provides peritoneal dialysis on-site for patients in the hospital.
  
  Read peritoneal dialysis patient John's story featured in Spotlight on Health
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Hemodialysis (HD)
With hemodialysis, an artificial kidney (dialyzer) filters your blood to remove toxic waste and fluids. Before treatments can begin, your doctor will need to create a site (dialysis access) where the blood can flow in and out of your body during the dialysis sessions. The type of dialysis access you have will depend in part on how quickly you need to begin hemodialysis.

• Home hemodialysis (HHD) – After you are trained, you do this dialysis treatment at home. This method often requires more frequent treatments to help you feel better.
• In-center nocturnal hemodialysis – You may opt to receive dialysis treatments overnight at our CentraCare Health Plaza site. Patients sleep while receiving about 8 hours of treatment three days per week. These slower, gentler treatments help you feel better while freeing up your day.
• In-center hemodialysis – You will visit one of our nine dialysis centers on a fairly set schedule. Hemodialysis usually is done three days a week and takes three to five hours a day.
• Acute hemodialysis – St. Cloud Hospital provides hemodialysis on-site for patients in the hospital.

Other CentraCare Kidney Program Services

Chronic Kidney Disease Management
CentraCare Kidney Program nephrologists and staff can help you manage chronic kidney disease. Through education and clinic visits, our team will work to help you avoid the need for a kidney transplant or dialysis.

Kidney Transplant Services
We work closely with several transplant centers to provide kidney transplants to patients. We are proud of the high kidney transplant rate of our patients.

Continuous Renal Replacement Therapy (CRRT)
CRRT treats acute kidney failure. Patients receive this treatment in the Intensive Care Unit at St. Cloud Hospital. With this therapy, patients have their blood cleaned continuously. This method allows for more gentle and constant removal of toxic waste and fluid.

Therapeutic Plasma Exchange (TPE)
TPE filters your blood to remove plasma and exchanges it for fresh plasma or a plasma substitute. It removes autoantibodies, toxins or metabolic substances from the blood. The most common diseases treated by plasma exchange are:

• Guillain-Barre
• Myasthenia gravis
• Lambert-Eaton syndrome
• Goodpasture’s syndrome
• Vasculitis
• Thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP).

You can receive TPE as an inpatient or outpatient.

Aquapheresis
Aquapheresis removes fluid from patients with heart failure when medicine does not work. CentraCare Kidney Program nephrologists work with cardiologists to provide this service.