Peritoneal Dialysis for Charlie.
Morning::
We start the morning by disconnecting Charlie from his dialysis cycler. In order to do that we need to put on a face mask wash our hands with antibacterial soap and dry them with paper towels. Then we go into his room and put mild bleach on to clean gauze and then we have to scrub his transfer set (the end of the catheter that is outside of his body) for 60 seconds to make sure its clean and then soak it with the gauze for another 60 seconds. Once that is done we disconnect the tube and put a cap on the transfer set for the day.
Next we draw up his medications and give them to him. There are about 10 different medications and vitamins he gets in the morning.
Then we do his vitals: blood pressure, weight and temperature. We also have to disconnect everything from the night before and dump all the fluids down the drain and record the numbers from the night before.
Night::
We start the night by giving Charlie his night medications. There are only 4 at night and a shot 3 times a week.
Then we take his vitals again before bed.
Generally, while one of us is doing meds and vitals the other is setting Charlie up for the night.
Set up we start by putting on a face mask and washing our hands just like we do in the morning. Then we get 2 3L bags of dextrose and 1 1L bag and we get them all hooked up to the cycler
Once that is all set up we can hook up Charlie. Its the same way we disconnect him in the morning but in reverse.
Then Charlie is hooked up in his bed for 12 hours we aim for 8 pm - 8 am.
