Successful management of bilateral emphysematous pyelonephritis with abscess formation in a chronic hemodialysis patient: a case report

Bilateral emphysematous pyelonephritis (EPN) has seldom been reported in patients on maintenance hemodialysis (HD). Percutaneous catheter drainage (PCD) or nephrectomy is often required in the treatment of bilateral EPN because of its poor response to antimicrobial agents and high mortality rate. We report a patient with bilateral EPN on maintenance HD. An octogenarian man with diabetes mellitus who had previously undergone regular HD for 22 months was admitted to our hospital because of severe inflammation resulting from bilateral EPN. His lesions of EPN had resulted in abscess formation in both kidneys and right and left side retroperitoneal space. As patient refused interventional therapy including nephrectomy or PCD, he was treated conservatively. After treatment with several antimicrobial agents for 50 days, he completely recovered from bilateral EPN. To our knowledge, this is the first case report of successful conservative management (antimicrobial therapy alone) of bilateral EPN that developed in a chronic diabetic HD patient.