Wow. Thank God, I can blog now because for the past days, I had, again, a constipated mind. I wanted to write but no ideas were coming out.

Anyway, we just finished decorating our house for Christmas. Last Saturday, we bought a new 5-foot-Christmas tree and a lot of Christmas decors. My mom said that she want it to be elegant so she chose gold for the decors but I suggested that it would be more stunning if we also use red. Red may be common for Christmas but I think it’s lovely to combine red and gold. And so she agreed. Hehehe.

Here’s a pic of our decorated Christmas tree and a part of our house:

This one is my mom’s finished product. This is composed of separate decors. Instead of buying a ready-made decor, she decided to make her own.

I really can not wait for Christmas! I wonder what my mom will cook for our Noche Buena. Mmmm. Yummy!

Last November 20, I attended a Peritioneal Dialysis Training and Workshop at the Philippine Heart Center. In the morning, we had some lectures about the dialysis which was presented by the outstanding renal nurse and doctors in PHC. We watched some videos on how to operate the dialysis machine and how to work on a CAPD or Continuous Ambulatory Peritoneal Dialysis. And in the afternoon, a live demonstration was held. There were four stations with different kinds of peritoneal dialysis.

There are two kinds of dialysis. One is hemodialysis where in your blood is being cleansed by a dialysis machine. This is done in a dialysis center.

The second kind is peritoneal dialysis. This kind of dialysis can be done at home. It’s purpose is to remove the wastes in your peritoneum. It is done by inserting a catheter in your abdomen (below your umbilicus) then probably after a couple of days, when the catheter is immobilized in your abdomen, a certain amount of fluid called dialysate is instilled in your abdomen. Depending on the doctor’s prescription, the dialysate will stay inside your abdomen for minutes to hours (indwelling time). After the prescribed indwelling time, the dialysate will be drained.

There are two types of Peritoneal Dialysis. One is called continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis. This type of PD doesn’t need a machine. Here’s an illustration:

The other type is called continuous cyclic peritoneal dialysis where a portable machine is used.

Thanks to this website for this image.
Those were just of the things taught to us. I was actually reviewing about dialysis the day before that and it is nice to learn more about it and seeing the actual demonstration of dialysis than just reading it in books. I appreciated dialysis more.

The lesson I learned in this training is that we should not take our kidneys for granted because once we abuse and make our dear kidneys stressed, it will lead us to a lot of renal problems. And this will only cause a lot of sufferings in the end.

Now, I am going back to my books because I only have a few days to prepare for my exam. Till my next blogging!

1. Aleli wrote:
   December 1st, 2007 at 1:49 am

   wow ang galing naman sis…nakapag seminar ka. ako last time ko makapag setup sa hemodialysis machine third year pa ako..limot na ako..

   and ung sa peritoneal dialysis fourth year pa ako..kaya limot ko na rin..ung mga computation sa forms ng pagrecord,limot na rin..wehehe.. pero enjoy un kaso parang bc..ahaha..

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