Hydrating Kidney Patients With Sodium Bicarb Has Little Effect

Tag : sodium

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 3 (HealthDay News) -- Hydrating kidney diseasepatients with sodium bicarbonate during coronary angiography is nomore effective in reducing the risk of serious kidney disease thanhydration with sodium chloride, researchers say.
Nephropathy is a serious kidney disorder and a known complicationof exposure to the iodine in the contrast agent used duringangiography. The risk of nephropathy related to contrast agentsranges from 2 percent in low-risk people to 50 percent in those whoare at high-risk.
Previous animal studies and one randomized clinical trial havesuggested that hydration with sodium bicarbonate may be effectivein preventing contrast-induced nephropathy.
A new study in the Sept. 3 Journal of the American Medical Association looked at 353 people with moderate to severe kidney disease whowere undergoing coronary angiography. The researchers randomlyassigned the patients to receive either sodium chloride or sodiumbicarbonate before, during, and after their angiography.
Overall, 13.9 percent of the patients developed contrast-inducednephropathy.
There was no difference between the sodium chloride and the sodiumbicarbonate groups in terms of developing nephropathy. Nor werethere differences between the groups in the rates of death,dialysis, heart attack, and cerebrovascular events.
These findings suggest that hydration with sodium bicarbonate isnot superior to hydration with sodium chloride in kidney diseasepatients who are undergoing coronary angiography, say theresearchers.
"Any true difference between the hydration strategies is likely tobe small and not clinically significant," the study's authorswrote.
More information
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute has more about coronary angiography .


-- Krisha McCoy
SOURCE: Columbia University, news release, Sept. 3, 2008
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