Importance

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Abstract

The costs of some blood treatments are strongly driven by the cost of the filter media. For example, hemofiltration and hemodiafiltration filters use expensive media to process blood. In operation, most of the pressure drop occurs near the input end of the filter. Since pressure is what drives fluid across the filter, this results in a low utilization of the filter media toward the outlet end. Also, as blood runs across the media, it lays down blankets of oriented proteins, which occlude flow through, and across, the media. According to the invention, a short filter with a flow restriction at the outlet maintains high blood-filtrate pressure differential and concomitant high utilization. Also, by reversing the flow of blood periodically, the occluding material may be removed increasing utilization overall and permitting the use of smaller quantities of expensive media.

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First Claim