Peritoneal Dialysis for Potential Kidney Transplant Recipients: Pride or Prejudice?

Kidney transplantation (KT) is recognized as the gold-standard of treatment for patients with end-stage renal disease. Additionally, it has been demonstrated that receiving a pre-emptive KT ensures the best recipient and graft survivals. However, due to an overwhelming discrepancy between the organs available and the patients on the transplant waiting list, the vast majority of transplant candidates require prolonged periods of dialysis before being transplanted. For many years, peritoneal dialysis (PD) and hemodialysis (HD) have been considered competitive renal replacement therapies (RRT). This dualistic vision has recently been questioned by evidence suggesting that an individualized and flexible approach may be more appropriate. In fact, tailored and cleverly planned changes between different RRT modalities, according to the patient’s needs and characteristics, are often needed in order to achieve the best results. While home HD is still under scrutiny in this particular setting, current data seems to favor the use of PD over in-center HD in patients awaiting a KT. In this specific population, the demonstrated advantages of PD are superior quality of life, longer preservation of residual renal function, lower incidence of delayed graft function, better recipient survival, and reduced cost.