Volume load monitoring and evaluation of dialysis patients

Dialysis patients generally have volume overload, but excessive liquid removal can result in low volume load, affecting the quality of dialysis. Volume load is usually evaluated by blood pressure, central venous pressure, edema state, skin elasticity, and other symptoms, although these methods are simple and feasible, the reliability is relatively poor. Isotopic dilution is the gold standard for assessing the volume load, but patients need to uptake the isotope, the evaluation method is complicated and has poor feasibility, therefore is difficult to be applied in clinical. In recent years, inferior vena cava diameter measurement, lung ultrasound, bioelectric impedance measurement, and serum marker methods were widely used in clinical settings. This paper reviews the methods of evaluating the volume load of dialysis patients and the validity, applicability, and limitation of the existing methods.