Dialysis patient had to overcome fear of needles

Dialysis patient had to overcome fear of needles
Posted Nov 19, 2009 By Chris Must

EMC News - For the past 23 years, Patti Marks has depended on machines to keep her alive.

A few years after being diagnosed with kidney reflux disease, the Westport resident began the three times weekly dialysis treatments which she says have taken over her life.

Currently back on the waiting list for a kidney transplant, Marks said she has had two unsuccessful transplants in the past. "Because of the two I've had, now it's harder to find a match," she said.

Marks started dialysis treatments in 1986, at the age of 25. For the past six years, she has been coming to the dialysis unit at the Smiths Falls Site of the Perth and Smiths Falls District Hospital. The unit served three patients when it opened 10 years ago, and today serves 27.

A hemodialysis machine takes the place of a normally-functioning kidney by filtering impurities and removing built up fluid from the patient's blood. Each treatment lasts four hours.

"It's kind of hard to keep a job when you're coming here three days a week," said Marks, who despite the challenge is able to enjoy a reasonably active social life. She volunteers at Junior B hockey games in Westport, and sometimes travels to out of town games. As well, she enjoys regular lunches out with friends. "Everybody says that I'm never at home," she said.

Marks said she first became aware that she had a significant health problem when she was going to college and kept getting sick. An x-ray revealed that she had no right kidney. Whether she was born without the kidney or whether it was destroyed by kidney reflux disease, the doctors were never able to decide.

Kidney reflux disease is found mainly in children who inherited it from their parents. The condition does not really originate in the kidneys, but actually begins in the bladder and could eventually affect the kidneys.

Normally the urine produced by the kidneys is transported through two tubes called ureters, then into the bladder. Urine is then excreted from the bladder through an exit tube called the urethra. Your bladder muscle normally contracts, when you urinate. When this happens, the openings from the ureters into the bladder are normally squeezed shut. This forces the urine to exit through the urethra and also prevents urine from going back into the kidneys.

With kidney reflux disease, the connection between the ureters and the bladder malfunctions. So when the bladder contracts during urination, the openings from the ureters into the bladder do not squeeze shut. This allows urine to go back up toward the kidneys as well as down through the urethra when the bladder muscle is contracted. When urine is forced back through the ureters and upwards into the kidneys, it puts pressure on the kidneys. Over time this pressure can damage both the ureters and the kidneys, causing them to dilate and eventually lead to impaired kidney function.

Marks didn't start dialysis treatments for five years after the condition was diagnosed. "I said I didn't want to do dialysis because I hated needles," she recalled. "At first, I didn't know what it was all about."

Her strongest emotion was fear: fear of the needles and of "how it was going to take over my life."

When she first started dialysis, Marks was working at a waitress and continued to do so for several more years, but "I was just getting too tired."

Today Marks, who comes from a family of 12, has two brothers and a sister living in Westport to help support her. She also has two sisters and a brother in Smiths Falls, and can stay with them if bad weather keeps her from driving.

It takes Marks about 40 minutes to drive to her treatments. People have asked her what happens if there is an ice storm, and she explains that not going to treatments is not an option.

"Dialysis isn't that great, but one thing about it is you've made lots of friends," said Marks, referring to the staff and other patients at the dialysis unit she has spent so many hours with.

The Kidney Foundation is relying on public support to help fund its programs for patients living with kidney disease as it hosts its annual 'Round Up for Research' fundraiser in Perth today (Thursday, Nov. 19).

http://www.emcperth.ca/20091119/news/Dialysis+patient+had+to+overcome+fear+of+needles