Right ventricular diastolic function in dialysis patients could be affected by vascular access.

Tricuspid annular plane excursion (TAPSE) measurement in echocardiography is a measure of heart diastolic distensibility: a low TAPSE indicates reduced ventricular distensibility leading to diastolic dysfunction. It is a good prognostic index for cardiac mortality risk in congestive heart failure patients, adding significant prognostic information to the NYHA clinical classification. Our study was designed to evaluate the effect of a single hemodialysis (HD) session on diastolic function and TAPSE, focusing on the effects of vascular access typology. Twenty chronically uremic patients (age 51 ± 10 years, dialytic age 24 ± 8 months), without overt heart disease, underwent conventional two-dimensional and Doppler echocardiography immediately before starting and 15 min after ending a mid-week HD session. Ten patients had distal radiocephalic arterovenous fistula (AVF), and 10 had permanent central venous catheters (CVC). The amount of fluid removed by HD was 2,706 ± 1,047 g/session. HD led to a reduction in TAPSE, left ventricle end-diastole volume, left ventricle end-systole volume, right ventricle end-diastole diameter, peak early transmitral flow velocity, and the ratio of early to late Doppler velocities of diastolic mitral flow. AVF patients showed greater right ventricle diameters versus CVC patients, while TAPSE appeared higher in the latter. Only the AVF patient group showed TAPSE values <15 mm. Our data confirm the effects of terminal uremia on right ventricle function (chamber dilation, impaired diastolic function), showing that these abnormalities are more frequent in AVF patients as opposed to CVC patients. It is reasonable to explain these clinical features as the effect of preload increase operated by AVF.