Abstract
Ten outpatients were studied during a single dialysis and six hospitalized patients were monitored during a week-long series of dialysis. The ten outpatients had significant increases in serum zinc from 73.2±8.8 to 89.5±11.2μg/dl after a 5-hour dialysis. The increase was partly a result of hemoconcentration as evidenced by a significant increase in the hematocrit during dialysis. To study diffusion, we measured zinc in the arterial blood and in the dialysate at the inflow and outflow sites of the dialyzer. There was an increase in the arterial blood zinc from 74±9.1 to 80.2±7.4μg/dl and a decrease in dialysate zinc from 11.0±2.8 to 10.6±6.8μg/dl, but there were not significant. We measured non-protein bound diffusible zinc by ultrafiltration; the diffusible zinc in serum averaged 7.8±2.9μg/dl which was 10.4% of total serum zinc. Our dialysate was 11.0μg/dl zinc. For the six patients, we measured protein intake and serum zinc daily, and serum zinc was also measured before and after 5-hour dialysis three times during the week. In 17 of 18 dialysis, the serum zinc increased after dialysis. We observed a good correlation between serum zinc concentration and total serum protein.
