Renal Doppler ultrasonographic findings in earthquake victims with crush injury

Objective. In the Marmara earthquake, which occurred on August 17, 1999, 63 9 people had renal complications, and 477 needed hemodialysis treatment bec ause of acute renal failure due to crush injury. Our objective was to use D oppler ultrasonography as a noninvasive procedure to provide renal hemodyna mic information. Methods. We evaluated 9 patients with severe crush injury by using Doppler ultrasonography to measure renal resistive indexes within 16 to 32 hours after the earthquake and 6 weeks later. All patients had acu te renal failure and underwent hemodialysis. Results. All measured initial resistive indexes were high (mean +/- SD, 0.83 +/- 0.08), and they were cor related with the number of hemodialysis sessions (r = 0.703; P = .034), the duration of hemodialysis treatment (r = 0.819; P = .007), and oligoanuria (r = 0.937; P < .0001). All patients recovered from the acute renal failure , and repeated Doppler ultrasonography showed significant decreases in resi stive indexes (0.59 +/- 0.07; P < .01) and renal lengths (P < .05). Conclus ions. In crush injury, measurement of renal resistive indexes can be useful for the prognosis of recovery from acute renal failure.