I Hate Dialysis Message Board

Dialysis Discussion => Dialysis: General Discussion => Topic started by: tyefly on January 17, 2011, 02:57:54 PM

Title: large needles
Post by: tyefly on January 17, 2011, 02:57:54 PM
  I have started using a 1 1/4 inch needle and was wondering if anyone else has used this....    I only use this size of needle in my venous....  I had to go to that size of needle   ( from a 1 inch )  to get a good flash as I am really deep....   I use to flash using the one inch but I think that my vein has moved......

    and about veins that move.....has anyone elses veins moved.....

also   I have grown  or at least it looks like I have grown  new veins in my arm around my fistual  and there are many more veins now in my upper chest area next to my arm.....  I have many  .... looks really funny   like a new road map... 
Title: Re: large needles
Post by: M3Riddler on January 17, 2011, 03:18:31 PM
If you have experienced a gain or loss of weight, this can affect your veins. This is also true with fluid gain/los.   these can all affect the veins position. 

Seeing new veins or seeing veins that are now visable that have not been seen before can be sign of a stenosis.

///M3R
Title: Re: large needles
Post by: tyefly on January 17, 2011, 03:40:06 PM
I have not lost weight or gained weight since I started D....  ok I have lost a few pounds since  I started D but not much.....  as far a fluid  I dont take much of   0.5k most of the time.....

 I do worry about stenosis.....  as my clinic wanted me to do 430 to 450 BFS when I first started Nxstage..... my pressures were high all the time....   I have dropped my BFS down to 370 sometime 350 and my pressures are really good now.... 

I went in for a fistulagram as my clinic could not understand why my pressures were that High....  Doctor who tried to do the fistulagram  ( but infiltrated my arm ) said that there wasnt anything wrong with my fistula and told me that its because of the High Blood flow speeds that the clinics require produces problems with fistulas and therefor needing fistulagrams annual....   which when a fistualgram is done it actually injures the fistula when they have to use a balloon to wide it out.... I was surprised.......  So now I am running slower   and I am doing dialysis longer because of the slower BFS...but  its worth it to me  to protect my fistula...... 

Seems like there are so many opinions on how to do all of this.....   some people believe faster is better  and other say slower is better....  doctors too have different opinions.....    I guess its like Chevy and Ford.....