Numbness in my toes.

[miket]

I'm on PD and I am non-diabetic, does anyone else on here have any numbness in their feet or toes. Mine started in my toes and now it's working its way towards the middle of my feet.

[boswife]

i only know that from a diabetic side of things.  Please get it checked out.... ya?!

[sutphendriver]

yes and it will probably get worse.  your doc can order a nerve study (not fun) to determine the cause.  I was diagnosed with  Peripheral Neuropathy.  it is mostly a diabetic condition , but is not uncommon in dialysis patients.  unfortunatly it is not curable or reversable in dialysis patients.  they can give you meds to help with the pain when it comes, and it will come.  Put me in the ER twice.  I developed "foot drop" which means I stumble around like a drunken idiot.  I lost any coordination, cant even put on my undies with out sitting down.  Im giving you the worst here because if you are just now getting numb, you need to get tested for Neuropathy and start treatment while you can still walk normal.

[Zach]

Miket,
Neuropathy can be caused by being under-dialyized.

You may need more intense dialysis, such as additional exchanges or even moving to nocturnal hemodialysis.
Also, too much Vitamin B₆ can cause neuropathy.

[billybags]

sutphendriver, I found your post really interesting. My husband is going down the same road. He can not feel his legs below his knees and needs sticks to walk around. He has been like this since he had a heart attack in Feb that is 4 months ago. We were suppose to have a neuro test last Tuesday where they put the needles in to your muscles but we had to cancel as we were in A&E with angina at the time. Next week we have a vascular test to see what is going on. My husband is not diabetic.This has really put our life on hold, he was doing so well on APD and along came this crap.

[sutphendriver]

i had the vascular test too.  the nerve test is uncomfortable to say the least.  here is a link that explains is better than i can  http://pdiconnect.com/cgi/reprint/18/2/172.pdf.  generally being under dialysed has little to do with it,it is caused by an imbalance in the cerebral spinal fluid, but it is something to check out.

[Zach]

...  generally being under dialysed has little to do with it,it is caused by an imbalance in the cerebral spinal fluid, but it is something to check out.

Obviously, neither you nor I know all the facts.

[Cordelia]

Sounds very familiar with the toes, I suffer from the exact same thing. I'm not diabetic. I got my numbness after I started dialysis. Welcome to neuropathy. It's a pain in the butt and very, very annoying and can be very, very painful.  ::)I totally can relate to you!

[miket]

Thanks for all the great feedback guys. My nephrologist is also a personal family friend so I have access to him all the time for random questions. He thinks it's from a pair of shoes, what a joke right. My dialysis nurse had a better idea of the situation, she said it was probably because of an imbalance from my PTH, phosphorus, Vit D, and my last kt/v came back 1.7 which is up from 1.53. Hopefully if I do get better dialyzed it will go away. I do 5 2.5L exchanges at night and a last fill of 2.5L and then I drain in 2-4 hours later.

[greg10]

Thanks for the posts sutphendriver.
However, contrary to what you wrote as "not curable or reversible", the PN (peripheral neuropathy) got better with one patient when he switched from PD to HD, in another the PN was cured when he had a transplant, therefore the studies suggest that acute PN was treatable in some cases.

In addition, two of the three patients in the study had type 2 diabetes, so they were susceptible to PN regardless of their ESRD.  With PD, you are carrying a lot of concentrated glucose in the dialysate and that may increase the probability of highly glycated proteins.  I would suggest, on purely speculative grounds, that some type of anti-glycation supplement (such as benfotiamine) could help reduce the symptoms of the PN by reducing glucose induced tissue damage of PD.  Alternatively, switching the mode of dialysis from CAPD to HD (hemodialysis) could help.  Consult with your nephrologist.
"Benfotiamine Protects against Peritoneal and Kidney Damage in Peritoneal Dialysis"
http://ihatedialysis.com/forum/index.php?topic=23079.0

"All 3 patients showed response to immunomodulatory
therapy. Mter plasmapheresis and treatment with
intravenous immunoglobulin, patient 1 could resume his job
as a teacher. The change from CAPD to hemodialysis led to
considerable clinical improvement in patient 2, and renal
transplantation brought nearly complete remission. Patient 3
showed"

yes and it will probably get worse.  your doc can order a nerve study (not fun) to determine the cause.  I was diagnosed with  Peripheral Neuropathy.  it is mostly a diabetic condition , but is not uncommon in dialysis patients.  unfortunatly it is not curable or reversable in dialysis patients.  they can give you meds to help with the pain when it comes, and it will come.  Put me in the ER twice.  I developed "foot drop" which means I stumble around like a drunken idiot.  I lost any coordination, cant even put on my undies with out sitting down.  Im giving you the worst here because if you are just now getting numb, you need to get tested for Neuropathy and start treatment while you can still walk normal.

i had the vascular test too.  the nerve test is uncomfortable to say the least.  here is a link that explains is better than i can  http://pdiconnect.com/cgi/reprint/18/2/172.pdf.  generally being under dialysed has little to do with it,it is caused by an imbalance in the cerebral spinal fluid, but it is something to check out.