Liberation From Acute Dialysis

Dialysis-requiring acute kidney injury (AKI-D) is a devastating complication among hospitalized patients for which there are no treatments other than supportive care. Recovery of sufficient renal function to stop dialysis is an unequivocally important clinical and patient-oriented outcome. Shortening dialysis duration and increasing the number of AKI-D patients who recover would have a major clinical, public health and cost-saving impact. However, there is currently no evidence to guide the delivery of dialysis to facilitate recovery. The investigators hypothesize that in patients who have AKI-D and who are hemodynamically stable, a conservative dialysis strategy--in which hemodialysis is not continued unless specific metabolic or clinical indications for renal replacement therapy (RRT) are present--will improve the likelihood of renal recovery compared with the current standard clinical practice of thrice-weekly intermittent dialysis. The investigators have conducted a pilot clinical trial to demonstrate the feasibility of this approach. The investigators propose here a 2-center randomized controlled trial to test a conservative dialysis strategy in a larger AKI-D population (N = 220).