Doing Dialysis the Emory Way
Dialysis is a lifeline for renal failure patients, but it is often exhausting. Patients usually have to undergo dialysis three times a week for up to four hours each visit. With the required investment of so much time, patients want a comfortable dialysis center that can provide excellent care.
Atlanta kidney patients will soon have new options for treatment. Emory Healthcare will open three new metro dialysis centers in January 2010. Emory Dialysis at Northside, located west of Georgia Tech, will offer 38 dialysis stations; Emory Dialysis at Greenbriar, inside Greenbriar Mall, will have 26 stations; and Emory Dialysis at Candler, south of I-20, will have 38 stations.
In planning for the centers, a team of Emory doctors and administrators visited dialysis facilities at Wake Forest University that have been run by Health Systems Management (HSM) of Tifton, Georgia, since 1983. Wake Forest University has the largest academic outpatient dialysis program in the nation, serving more than 1,500 patients in 15 facilities. The Emory team liked the Wake Forest model and subsequently contracted with HSM to staff and operate the new centers in Atlanta, which will be overseen by Emory doctors.
"As an academic medical center, we must set the standard for care," says Emory nephrologist Jeff Sands, MD, who had long advocated for Emory-owned centers. "Our clinical care for patients with chronic kidney failure is outstanding, and we want to provide that same level of care for patients in outpatient settings."
Emory's dialysis centers will provide significant advantages for Emory such as learning opportunities for nursing and medical students and residents, as well as clinical research opportunities that can translate to improvements in patient care. For example, one recent Emory finding helps dialysis patients sleep better. Patients who receive dialysis in the afternoon often report trouble sleeping that night and the following night, but by cooling dialysis fluid from 37˚C to 35˚C, researchers have found that patients sleep better. Why? Warmer dialysis fluid interrupts the body's ability to cool its core temperature as the patient falls asleep.
The new centers will feature individual stations that include reclining chairs, flat-panel televisions and state-of-the-art equipment. Doctors will be able to access the dialysis computers remotely to check on a patient's vital signs if a nurse discovers a potential problem.
Dr. Sands adds that the new centers are part of Emory's continuing commitment to the Atlanta community. "Owning our dialysis centers gives us a significant advantage in controlling the quality of care, advancing the science of medicine and effectively training the next generation of physicians and ancillary staff. This is all so that we can care more effectively for the many patients who suffer from this terrible disease."
