Question

. Conceptual Question: A dialysis machine is used as a treatment for patients with diabetes, sickle cell anemia, kidney disease, kidney failure, etc. Specifically, which part of the kidney does a dialysis machine mimic? Explain your answer. Please write complete sentences for your answer to obtain full credit.

Answer 1

Dialysis machine mimics the filtration by the glomerulus

Dialysis substitutes natural work of the kidney involved in glomerular filteration, in addition to this the kidneys also secrete certain products that are important in metabolism, but dialysis cannot perform this function, it can only filter your blood, and like a health kidney, removes waste from your blood.

A healthy person’s kidneys filter around 50 gallons of blood a day. Of that amount, about one-half to two quarts of fluid and waste products are removed from the blood and passed out of the body in urine each day. If the kidneys are not working correctly, waste builds up in the blood. Eventually, this can lead to coma and death.

Dialysis prevents the waste products in the blood from reaching dangerous levels.