Peritoneal dialysis-related peritonitis in southern Thailand

To evaluate peritonitis in children receiving peritoneal dialysis (PD) in southern Thailand.

We reviewed the records of patients who received PD at the Department of Pediatrics, Prince of Songkla University from January 1994 to December 2003.

Forty-six patients had PD performed for 228.6 patient-months. Their mean age was 9.5+/-4.8 years (range 3.0 months-16.7 years). Twenty-eight patients had complications with 61 episodes of peritonitis. The age, sex and causes of renal failure did not display any differences between patients who had or did not have peritonitis (p=0.2, 0.6 and 0.6, respectively). The first peritonitis occurrence was on average at 2.7+/-4.0 patient-months (median 0.4, range 0-12.5) following catheter insertion, with an average incidence rate of one infection per 3.5+/-4.8 patientmonths (median 1.0, range 0-23.2). The causative agents were both gram-positive and gram negative bacteria, and fungi at 24%, 44%, and 8% respectively (24% of the cultures did not grow). There was no significant difference in causative agents between home- and hospital-acquired peritonitis (p=1.0).

PD-related peritonitis in this study occurred earlier and more often than in other studies, probably because all of our PDs were performed immediately after catheter insertion.