Effect of biofiltration on cardiac arrhythmias

The effect of biofiltration-PAN system and acetate-cuprophan hemodialysis on ventricular arrhythmias detected by long-term ECG monitoring was assessed in 12 patients with end-stage renal failure, studied according to a randomized cross-over design. Low and high risk ventricular ectopic beats were significantly (p less than 0.001) more frequent both during acetate dialysis and in the post-dialytic period than with biofiltration at any time. A significant inverse correlation was found in regression analysis (r = 0.40, p less than 0.001) between total ventricular ectopic beats and pH values in the pre-dialytic, intra-dialytic, early post-dialytic and total post-dialytic periods. The lower frequency of ectopic ventricular beats in biofiltration dialysis makes this technique more suitable for patients with dangerous and disabling arrhythmias.