Abstract
The patients in a chronic kidney failure are generally treated with a hemodialyzer as a substitute for their kidney. The antithrombogenicity is highly required to the hollow fiber membrane inside a hemodialyzer. To improve that of the polysulfone (PSf) membrane which is mainly used, a hydrophilic polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) polymer is blended to it.
We focused on the mobility of the bound water to the hydrophilic polymer, and found a new hydrophilic polymer (NV polymer) which was more antithrombogenic than PVP polymer. Applying the NV polymer to the PSf membrane surface in the nanometer order, we created an extremely antithrombogenic hollow fiber membrane for hemodialysis, which made the number of the platelet adhesion less than a hundredth compared with a conventional PSf membrane with PVP polymer.
