How does dialysis scheduling work?

[dseagrav]

Is dialysis scheduled to meet X hours per week or to maintain an interval?

I do tuesday-thursday-saturday but I would like to have free weekends a couple times out of the year. Can I do tues-wed-thursday and monday of the next week so that I am free on friday-saturday-sunday or is there an interval they need to maintain?

[Rerun]

It is pretty much M-W-F or Tu-Tr-Sat    The best is MWF so you get Sat and Sun off. 

I do nocturnal which is 8 hours at night incenter.... Sun night, Tue night and Thur night so I get Friday Sat and most of Sun off. 

Pick your poison.   

Now, you could do home dialysis and pick your own days.

[dseagrav]

I guess I worded it badly. I'm doing incenter dialysis now. The schedule doesn't bother me, normally. There's just a couple weekends out of the year I'd like to have free. I'm asking if it's possible for them to rearrange the schedule one week to give me friday-saturday-sunday off if notified far enough in advance. I can't really justify taking a trip to a three-day event if I'm going to have to miss the busiest third of it (saturday). So far all of the dialysis travel info I have seen is centered around having your dialysis done on the regular schedule somewhere away from home. I'm trying to not have it done for those specific three days. This is two, maybe three times a year.

This is important to me, my entire life was centered around these trips. I used to work all year to have the opportunity to go. This is the only time I get to see my friends. I want to know what options I have and how insistent I can be with the center staff. I don't know if what I'm asking for is physically possible or even feasible. I've asked about it a couple of times but everyone seems more interested with scaring me into compliance so they can just get paid and not have to deal with any hassle. All they seem to tell me is that if I don't do what they say when they say it I will get sick and die.

[cattlekid]

I was T-Th-Sa when I was in center.  There were two times that I can remember that I had an all-day Saturday event that was non-negotiable.  I gave the staff plenty of notice and asked them politely if I could switch to the Friday shift instead for those weeks.  It was my understanding from the staff that Friday third shift was not overly busy so it always seemed to be an okay option. 

The only drawback was that by the next Tuesday, I knew I was in for a doozy of a treatment due to the amount of fluid I needed to take off.  I always kept my fluid gains to a minimum but that extra day always seemed to do me in.

[Simon Dog]

Shorter intervals: good
Longer intervals: bad

A big problem with the traditional 3x/week dialysis schedule is the "long gap" between Sat and Tues or Fri and Mon.    You may get away with a "skip", but it's not good for your long term health.    Best bet is to either visit a center while traveling, or get on an NxStage and bring it with you.

[Rerun]

Okay, sorry I guess I went on and on.  Yes, our center switches all the time for people.  They probably would not for me but the do for others. 

[noahvale]

*

[galvo]

I never have any trouble re-arranging days. Only a couple of times a year. I'm blowed if I'm  going to do D on my birthday. Talk to your centre. If they're any good, they'll come to the ball. Remember, we dialyise to live, not live to dialyse.

[Zach]

First of all ...
Welcome to IHD, dseagrav!!
I hope when you have a moment, you might tell us a little about yourself in the introduction section:
http://ihatedialysis.com/forum/index.php?action=post;board=14.0

Here is mine (it's a bit old):
http://ihatedialysis.com/forum/index.php?topic=1043.msg11528#msg11528

As far as your query, let me review and give you my take:
Your usual treatment schedule is Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday.
That means your "weekend" is between Sunday and Tuesday.
And your event is Friday through Sunday.

Perhaps you could schedule your last treatment before travel for the early morning shift on Friday, say 5 a.m., if that time is available.
Then you can travel to the location of your event Friday mid-morning (and get a little sleep) and Party from Friday afternoon till Sunday evening.  Return late Sunday night for the 5 a.m. treatment on Monday.  This would still be the normal "weekend."
In this case, prior to and after the trip your treatment schedule would look like this: Sa-T-TH-F ... M-T-TH-Sa.

If you must be at the event first thing Friday morning, then perhaps dialyze Thursday evening, say 5 p.m., if that leaves you time to travel later that night.  And schedule the return dialysis treatment at the 5 a.m. shift Monday morning.  This way, you have "only" added another 12 hours to your regular "weekend" between treatments:  Sa-T-Th ... M-T-Th-Sa.

It's not the best for your health, and you must watch what you eat and drink, but it is possible. After all, you are only talking about doing this a few times a year!  Just keep the salt, fluid and potassium intake to a minimum.  And take your phosphorus binders!!

I hope I haven't made this more complicated than it needed to be.

Regards,
--Zach
 

[PatDowns]

First of all ...
Welcome to IHD, dseagrav!!
I hope when you have a moment, you might tell us a little about yourself in the introduction section:
http://ihatedialysis.com/forum/index.php?action=post;board=14.0

Here is mine (it's a bit old):
http://ihatedialysis.com/forum/index.php?topic=1043.msg11528#msg11528

As far as your query, let me review and give you my take:
Your usual treatment schedule is Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday.
That means your "weekend" is between Sunday and Tuesday.
And your event is Friday through Sunday.

Perhaps you could schedule your last treatment before travel for the early morning shift on Friday, say 5 a.m., if that time is available.
Then you can travel to the location of your event Friday mid-morning (and get a little sleep) and Party from Friday afternoon till Sunday evening.  Return late Sunday night for an early treatment on Monday.  This would still be the normal "weekend."
In this case, prior to and after the trip your treatment schedule would look like this: Sa-T-TH-F ... M-T-TH-Sa.

If you must be at the event first thing Friday morning, then perhaps dialyze Thursday evening, say 5pm, if that leaves you time to travel later that night.  And schedule the return dialysis treatment at the 5am shift Monday morning.  This way, you have "only" added another 12 hours to your regular "weekend" between treatments.  Sa-T-Th... M-T-Th-Sa.

It's not the best for your health, and you must watch what you eat and drink, but it is possible. After all, you are only talking about doing this a few times a year!  Just keep the salt, fluid and potassium intake to a minimum.

I hope I haven't made this more complicated than it needed to be.

Regards,
--Zach
 

Not to quibble with you, Zach, but the average for profit clinic will not allow a patient to get in more than 3 treatments per week without an order of medical necessity from the physician.  They are reimbursed x3 weekly.

[Zach]

Not to quibble with you, Zach, but the average for profit clinic will not allow a patient to get in more than 3 treatments per week without an order of medical necessity from the physician.  They are reimbursed x3 weekly.

You may be right, PatDowns.

In that case, the return schedule might end up like this:  Monday-Thursday-Saturday, which would be 2 "weekends" in a row.  Still possible, as this sometimes happens during the Christmas and New Year dialysis schedule changes.

PS:  If you, dseagrav, still urinate, that might help a little.

[PatDowns]

You may be right, PatDowns.

In that case, the return schedule might end up like this:  Monday-Thursday-Saturday, which would be 2 "weekends" in a row.  Still possible, as this sometimes happens for the Christmas and New Year dialysis schedule changes.

PS:  If you, dseagrav, still urinate, that might help a little.

Noahvale, above, also gave a possible schedule where dseagrav could still get in 3 treatments per week w/o having to go back to back and get the weekend off.  On Thanksgiving and Christmas (when not falling on a Sunday), my clinic rotates schedules so no one has to come in on those days while still getting x3 weekly w/o going back to back.

Example:  Christmas is on Wed. this year.  That week, MWF patients will come in Sun-Tu-Fri and TTS patients will do Mon-Thur-Sat.   From my understanding, all clinics work on the Sunday through Saturday calendar week, so all treatments would be within the one week time frame.

[cdwbrooklyn]

I agree with Zach, you can request to do treatment on Thursday evening or Friday early morning and early Monday morning.  When I was in-center, I never really told the staff I was going on a vacation trip.  I always said it was job related so they would not give me any problems and it worked.  However, I did tell them I was going to the Bahamas one week because it was last minute. Instead of coming in Saturday morning, I called and told the staff I'll be in Saturday evening.  My schedule was Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday early morning 5am.  I go to church on Saturday so I did dialysis at 5am before going to church.  I was in the Bahamas form Sunday – Thursday missing one treatment.  I feel fine and it didn't affect me at all.  So if you really did not miss any treatments thorough the year and you really looking forward to this trip.  GO, GO, GO and have a good time.