It's akin to entrusting one's life to untrained hands! There are close to 150 dialysis technicians in the capital, but none of them is scientifically trained or certified to man the dialysis units in various facilities. A majority of dialysis technicians and nurses in the State capital are incapable of handling an emergency situation during a dialysis session.
A series of studies conducted by Hyderabad Kidney Foundation (HKF), a support group for dialysis patients, and nephroplus in the capital, reveals that the knowledge among dialysis technicians is ‘limited' and that puts life of the patients at risk. A majority of them have received only on-the-job training and lack theoretical expertise.
Members of HKF assert that due to unqualified technicians, cases of cross-infections and failure of fistula, the surgical passage needed for dialysis, are on the rise in the capital. Location wise, for a fistula to work there are very few places in the human body and that's why dialysis patients have to protect their fistula opening at any cost. But, unfortunately it is not the case. The prevalence of Hepatitis C among dialysis patients due to cross infection is 33 per cent.
“Nephrologists will not be available 24 hours in a dialysis unit and as a result, technicians and nurses have to be well trained. In case a patient while undergoing dialysis bleeds, technicians must be capable of stopping it. We have seen that 99 per cent of cross-infections in a dialysis unit are due to faulty processes of untrained technicians,” says Kamal. D. Shah, founder of HKF and co-founder of Nephroplus.
Unlike in India, in Western countries only trained and ‘certified' dialysis technicians and nurses are allowed to handle patients on dialysis. “We are trying to bring such best practices by collaborating with agencies in United States and provide training to technicians. Dialysis patients also need a lot of emotional support, but nobody bothers to look into that aspect,” Mr. Shah added. For more details on dialysis technicians, call on 80089-64888.
