Clinical Monitoring of AVG vs Laparoscopic PD Catheter Placement
Winner: Laparoscopic PD Placement

6-1 split

Laparoscopic PD catheter placement won this battle hands down. Seems the blue-ribbon panel (BRP) didn’t have much love for monitoring AV access for stenosis. A huge strike in favor of peritoneal dialysis (they way we see it). Here is a comment from the BRP: “laparoscopic placement of a PD catheter means I may be able to get PD started much faster, maybe more reliably, and that means I’m more likely to have a PD patient.” Another commented about a potential candidate for next year: “I would love to see the rookie embedded PD catheter make it to NephMadness! in ‘16”. Maybe an entire PD region for ‘16 NephMadness, we will see. Next up, Team Laparoscopic PD will make a run at another hemodialysis player, Team Downstream Vascular Biology. Will the feisty PD representative have what it takes to make it to the elite 8 and rule RRT. We will see.

Downstream Vascular Biology vs Antibiotic Catheter Locks
Winner: Downstream Vascular Biology

4-3 split

The upstart Team Downstream Vascular Biology is full of unknowns. However, that hasn’t stopped their terrific run in this year’s NephMadness. Maybe the BRP was a little nervous about the potential for antibiotic resistance if Abx catheters are used all the time. We can definitely see that potential. However, understand the molecular events leading to access failure could open up an entire avenue of novel therapies to maintain the achilles heal of dialysis. One BRP member commented: “Vascular Biology has new plays the field hasn’t seen before”. The enticing potential for translational research was just too much to overcome for the simplistically minded antibiotic catheter lock or was this a defeat to catheters in general, hmm. Next up for Team Downstream is Laparoscopic PD placement. Can’t wait for this one.

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