Peritoneal artificial kidney

Claim 1

An artificial kidney including a peritoneal dialysis system which prevents protein loss, permits the peritoneal fluid to be circulated through the peritoneal cavity at a high circulation rate, and obviates the need for heat sterilization, comprising: a closed-loop peritoneal circuit including means for introducing a prepared solution into the peritoneal cavity to draw toxic metabolites therefrom into the fluid, the fluid exiting from the cavity as peritoneal fluid, a separator containing a selective membrane having a high permeability to low molecular weight toxic metabolites but a low permeability to high molecular weight protein, and means for circulating the peritoneal fluid through the separator on one side of the selective membrane, the fluid exiting from that side of the membrane being returned to the peritoneal cavity; and a single-pass reconstitution circuit including a hyperfilter impermeable to ions and to organic matter, and having an inlet, a permeate outlet, and a residue outlet, means for introducing tap water into the inlet of the hyperfilter, means for introducing a concentrate including sugar and salts into the water exiting from the permeate outlet of the hyperfilter to form a water concentrate solution, and means for utilizing the resulting water-concentrate solution for maintaining substantially constant the original concentration of sugar and salt in the peritoneal fluid as the waste metabolites, passing through said separator, are moved from the peritoneal fluid, said separator being a dialyser, and said last-named means introducing said water-concentrate solution into the dialyser on the other side of the selective membrane.