Journal of the American Society of Nephrology
2007 JASN IMPACT FACTOR 7.111 HOME   AUTHOR INFO   EDITORIAL BOARD   SUBSCRIBE   FEEDBACK   ALERTS   HELP 
    advanced
CURRENT ISSUE ARCHIVES JASN Express ONLINE SUBMISSION


This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow reprints & permissions
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Burkart, J.
Right arrow Articles by Hylander, B.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Burkart, J.
Right arrow Articles by Hylander, B.

Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, Vol 1, Issue 10 1186-1190, Copyright © 1991 by American Society of Nephrology

REGULAR ARTICLES

Usefulness of peritoneal fluid amylase levels in the differential diagnosis of peritonitis in peritoneal dialysis patients

J Burkart, S Haigler, R Caruana and B Hylander
Department of Medicine, Bowman Gray School of Medicine of Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC 27103.

Peritonitis continues to be a major cause of morbidity in peritoneal dialysis patients despite recent technological advances (Y systems) that have reduced peritonitis rates to much more acceptable levels. Most of the time when a peritoneal dialysis patient presents with peritonitis, it is infectious in origin. However, these patients occasionally develop other intra-abdominal pathology that requires more intensive medical care or, at times, surgical intervention. To help in the early differential diagnosis of the cause of peritonitis in these patients, peritoneal fluid amylase levels were prospectively obtained from 50 patients presenting to the hospital with peritonitis. Thirty- nine of them had typical infectious peritonitis, and their mean peritoneal fluid amylase level was 11.1 (range, 0 to 90). Six patients had pancreatitis and a mean peritoneal fluid amylase level of 550 U/L (range, 100 to 1,140 U/L). Five patients were found to have other intra- abdominal pathology, and their mean peritoneal fluid amylase level was 816 U/L (range, 142 to 1,746 U/L). In patients who did not respond to initial therapy, sequential peritoneal fluid amylase levels did not increase in patients with typical infectious peritonitis whereas it did increase in patients with other intra-abdominal pathology. In conclusion, it was found that peritoneal fluid amylase levels were helpful in the differential diagnosis of peritonitis in these patients. An elevated level (greater than 100 U/L) differentiated those patients with other intra-abdominal causes of peritonitis from those with typical infectious peritonitis.




HOME CURRENT ISSUE ARCHIVES JASN Express ONLINE SUBMISSION AUTHOR INFO
EDITORIAL BOARD SUBSCRIBE FEEDBACK ALERTS HELP

Copyright © 2008 by the American Society of Nephrology. Online ISSN: 1533-3450 Print ISSN: 1046-6673