Principle of Osmosis Applied to Dialysis

Principle of Osmosis Applied to Dialysis

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Principle of Osmosis Applied to Dialysis

The human body has different body organs that perform different functions to maintain stability and coordination. Some of these organs are the bean shaped human kidneys, placed just at the real of the abdominal cavity. These organs carry out a number of functions within the body. They are responsible for cleansing of waste chemicals that are in the blood, getting rid of excessive fluid, and they are one of the locations where red blood cells are manufactured. In addition, they are important in the regulation of blood pressure since they process rennin, which is used for this function. Further, they assist in the absorption of chemicals such as phosphorus and calcium. In concise, kidneys perform very critical functions in the body and are, therefore, very essential in the body. Kidney failure can mean even death to an individual (Cameron, 2002).

Kidney Dialysis

As seen in the introduction, the function(s) of kidneys are essential for the normal functioning of the human body, and its failure could mimic catastrophic results including the demise of the individual. According to Cameron (2002), a medical cure to treat the condition of the failed kidney was first proposed in the year 1854, by one Thomas Graham. However, this was not a direct treatment as he only proposed a principle to copycat the function of the kidney, since the kidney itself could not be treated at this level. His proposed principle proposed the use of a semi-permeable membrane to transport solute. Further development of this process was seen in the next 6 years when Quinton and Scribner availed this procedure to kidney failure patients through a plastic tube connected to a vain and artery called the arteriovenous shunt (Cameron, 2002)

Taking into consideration the essentiality of the kidney function, a person with failed kidneys cannot live a healthy, normal life. The kidneys are very instrumental in maintaining the required level of minerals in the blood stream, and in filtering out metabolites that have no use to the body. These wastes also contain compounds that could be harmful to the human body because they have been intoxicated during the chemical procedures (Lai, 2009). The kidney filters these through concentration and releases them through the urine during the excretion whenever they are full. These functions can only be substituted by kidney dialysis after kidney failure (Cameron, 2002).

Osmosis and Dialysis

The process of dialysis that was developed in the year 1854 uses the principle of osmosis. Osmosis is the movement of solutes, (which include chemicals in this case), from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration. Osmosis ensures that the solute is dissolved equally throughout the solvent. This process occurs through a semi-permeable membrane, a boundary that allows certain solutions in and others out (Strathmann, 2011). This principle is utilized by the kidney, although instead of the solute spreading to the solvent, the solvent moves towards the area where the solute is highly concentrated in order to dissolve and dilute it. The main idea of osmosis is to achieve equilibrium of the dissolved solutes. The kidney is able to filter selective minerals from the blood stream and direct them for excretion. This keeps the blood clean and the body fully functional without any unwanted chemicals (Lai, 2009).

The artificial dialysis machines utilize the same osmosis principal to filter unwanted toxic chemicals from the body where the kidneys are no longer functional (Strathmann, 2011). A semi-permeable membrane is used to cleanse the blood by placing the blood against a large volume of a liquid (dialysis solution). The semi-permeable membrane allows only selective materials across and does not allow large particles such as blood cells and proteins across. Electrolytes are also able to go across the membrane. When they are in excess, the body is able to get rid of them through osmosis. However, salts, minerals, and water can move either to or from the blood.