Determination of peritoneal phosphate transport as a tool for controlling serum phosphorus

Hyperphosphataemia (serum phosphorus ≥5.5mg/dl) is an independent mortality factor for the dialysis population. We compared phosphorus, creatinine and urea peritoneal transport to demonstrate differences and indicate the relevance of these parameters in the control of serum phosphorus.

We included 60 patients on peritoneal dialysis and determined the dialysate/plasma phosphorus (D/P P) and creatinine (D/P Cr) ratios, weekly creatinine clearance (CrCl) and phosphorus clearance (PCl), weekly Kt/V of urea, and peritoneal phosphorus excretion (PEx).

D/P P was higher in patients with normal phosphataemia, compared with those who were hyperphosphataemic 0.61±0.13 versus 0.54±0.10 (p=.035). We observed an adequate correlation between D/P P and D/P Cr, r=0.90, p<.05, but poor concordance between both, with a lower limit of −0.17 (−0.24 to −0.09 95% CI) and an upper limit of 0.47 (0.39-0.54 95% CI) for D/P Cr with respect to D/P P. PCl had an adequate correlation with D/P P in patients with a Kt/V ≥1.7 (r=0.384, p=.04) and in anuric patients (r=0.392, p=.04), but not with D/P Cr. There was poor concordance of the CrCl with respect to PCl with a lower limit of −13.54l/week/1.73m2 BSA (−21.68 to −5.4 95% CI) and an upper limit of 58.98l/week/1.73m2 BSA (50.84-67.12 95% CI). Total PEx was related to PCl (r=0.643, p<.05), while it was not related to CrCl (r=0.222, p=.23). Using the CHAID method, we created a classification tree for phosphorus transport based on its D/P, obtaining 5 nodes (≤0.5, 0.51-0.55, 0.56-0.66, 0.67-0.76, >0.76), with statistically significant differences between nodes for serum phosphorus, total and peritoneal PCl and weekly Kt/V of urea.

D/P P and PCl are not concordant with D/P Cr and CrCl respectively and therefore their determination is a clinical tool to control serum phosphorus levels.