DOES THE USE OF ERYTHROPOIETIN IN HEMODIALYSIS-PATIENTS INCREASE DIALYSIS GRAFT THROMBOSIS RATES

Erythropoietin (EPO) is highly efficacious in the treatment of the ane mia of chronic renal failure. Evidence for a reported serious side eff ect, increased dialysis graft thrombosis, is equivocal. Sixty-four hem odialysis patients utilizing polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) grafts wer e treated with EPO. The patients served as their own historical contro ls. There were 1.188 thrombectomies and 0.222 mechanical problems per 1,000 patient-days prior to the initiation of EPO treatment. With EPO, the values were 0.656 and 0.222, respectively. Patients were separate d into low-, medium-, and high-dose EPO groups and analyzed within gro ups for the effect of EPO and between groups for a dose-dependent resp onse. According to an analysis of variance procedure, there was no sta tistically significant differences between the groups, which suggests that EPO is not thrombogenic to dialysis grafts.