Holter Monitoring of Cardiac Arrhythmias in Hemodialysis Patients

Cardiovascular complications and arryhthmias are common observations in hemodialysis patients with chronic renal failure. The complications are risk factors for mortality in these patients. In 34 hemodialysis patients for a period of 24 hours, supraventricular and ventricular frequent (>30/ minute) and rate (>30/minute) arrhythmias were evaluated by ambulatory electrocardiograms, during hemodialysis and in the first four and subsequent 8- 24 hours afler hemodialysis respectively. We observed an increase in both types of arrhythmias. There were significant differences in frequent arrhythmias (p<0.01) of supraventricular type and in both frequent and rare arrhythmias (p<0.05 and p<0.01 respectivcly) of ventricular type This report once more stresses the importance of following up hemodialysis patients for arrhythmias.