[Peritonitis in continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis. Microbiological and clinical evaluation]

In 1976, Popovich et al. described a technique of peritoneal dialysis using bottled dialysate. Later Oreopoulos et al. modified the technique by using plastic bags. But peritonitis still is a major and potentially serious complication of peritoneal dialysis. We have evaluated a) microbiologic diagnostic methods for infectious peritonitis, b) incidence of etiologic agents, and c) the evolution during antimicrobial treatment. Eighteen patients with chronic renal failure of diverse causes were followed from initiation of the CAPD program since January 1981 until June 1988. There were 80 episodes of infectious peritonitis during 17 patient-years of dialysis with an overall incidence of peritonitis of 4.7 episodes/patient-year. The total volume centrifuged technique and culture of sediment showed a sensibility of 85% in 73 episodes where cultures were obtained. The 59.1% of episodes of peritonitis were caused by gram negative bacilli; 11.6% were due to Acinetobacter calcoaceticus and Gram positive cocci accounted for 37.3%. These results are different from those found in other countries because most of our patients had received antimicrobial agents which probably changed their body flora, some did not have manual ability, others were of bad hygienic habits and finally, all of them had frequent contact with hospital environment. The species most frequently isolated were coagulase negative staphylococci (12.8%), probably from patients' skin flora. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)