Role of different kinds of dialysis in the treatment of refractory heart failure

Cardiorenal syndrome is a severe and potentially lethal disease in which heart and kidney failures coexist. The classic treatment with loop diuretics is ineffective due to the resistance of the kidney to those drugs, which requires the use of other therapies, such as extracorporeal ultrafiltration and peritoneal dialysis. This last technique is useful both in the acute treatment of acute heart decompensation and the chronic management of heart failure, because it improves heart function by reducing the volume overload, which in turn contributes to improving the kidney function with a limited number of side effects, which makes it the technique of choice for the treatment of diuretic-resistant heart failure. In this review, we present a description of the different kinds of cardiorenal syndrome, as well as the different treatments that are used, with special attention to the different modalities of peritoneal dialysis.