Lynsey Stronach

For children on haemodialysis, coping with the demands of the therapy can be a time consuming and exhaustive process. Required to visit the hospital three times a week for four hours at a time, school work and holidays are disrupted and a great strain can be placed on the whole family. Thankfully, due to your generosity, the hospital now employs a full time home haemodialysis nurse, Lynsey Stronach. Lynsey’s job can be roughly split into two key tasks.

Firstly, she spends four weeks training each patient and their family on how to use the home dialysis equipment. This intensive course takes place at Weston House, which provides the perfect transitional location, between the hospital and the patient’s home.

Secondly, Lynsey provides ongoing support for the family as they become accustomed to taking the lead in the care of their child.

Indeed it’s this change in mindset that Lynsey highlights as a key challenge for families adapting to home dialysis:

“Whilst having dialysis in the hospital can be stressful with long commutes to the hospital and tight diet and a fluid restriction, home dialysis offers a new kind of stress to patients and their family.

Removing the safety net of hospital care can be daunting at first and it’s my role to provide technical, medical and emotional support as they adapt.

A child on home haemodialysis is on minimal diet and fluid restrictions. However managing these restrictions, the vascular access and the dialysis, is probably the biggest fear that parents have and why it’s not the best option for all families.

When home dialysis is adopted though, it really can transform the life of a patient both medically and socially with the greater freedom it provides. Just recently two of my patients, Adam and Maya, have travelled abroad with their families for the first time thanks to home dialysis.

Another two of my patients now conduct their dialysis at night, freeing their daytime to go to school and play with friends.

It may seem a simple idea, moving dialysis from the hospital to the home, but it really does changes lives”.