Nephrologists Treat Crush Syndrome in Haiti with Dialysis

[okarol]

Nephrologists Treat Crush Syndrome in Haiti with Dialysis
01/27/2010

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti—In the wake of Haiti’s devastating earthquake, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières’s (MSF) sent a team of nephrologists to the island to treat “crush syndrome” survivors with dialysis.

Immediately after the earthquake, MSF said it sent a nine-person team to Port-au-Prince General Hospital and flew in four dialysis machines to treat those at risk for renal failure.

Crush syndrome is a condition in which muscle tissues damaged by severe internal injury release massive quantities of toxins into the blood, leading to kidney failure, according to MSF. Left untreated, crush syndrome can be fatal.

The first “crush syndrome” patient was placed on dialysis on Jan. 18, and within a week the MSF team had performed more than 50 dialysis sessions.

Click HERE -- http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news/article.cfm?id=4229&cat=voice-from-the-field&ref=home-sidebar-right to read MSF nephrologist Stefaan Maddens’ first-hand account of treating crush syndrome during his first two days in Port-au-Prince.

http://www.renalbusiness.com/hotnews/nephs-treat-haiti-crush-syndrome.html

[Zog]

I read about the history of that condition about a week ago on this blog post:
http://historyofnephrology.blogspot.com/2010/01/bombs-and-rhabdomyolysis.html

I hope they all can get access to dialysis.  I would imagine it is a tough thing to do for suffering person who doesn't have an access with the limited supplies in Haiti.