Emerging therapies for the management of chronic hyperkalemia in the ambulatory care setting

Barriers to guideline mandated renin-angiotensin inhibitor use: focus on hyperkalaemia

Hyperkalaemia in patients with chronic disease states can be caused by both abnormalities of potassium homeostasis as well as extrinsic factors such as medication use and potassium intake. In patients with heart failure (HF), chronic kidney disease (CKD), diabetes mellitus (DM), and in those who use renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system inhibitors (RAASi), there is particularly increased risk of chronic or recurrent hyperkalaemia. Hyperkalaemia is often a reason for the suboptimal dosing or complete discontinuation of RAASi. This review presents current options for the management of hyperkalaemia in patients with chronic disease states. It also explores barriers to guideline-mediated RAASi prescribing patterns in these high-risk patients and highlights the unmet need for agents that adequately manage hyperkalaemia in patients with chronic diseases on concomitant RAASi therapy.

A curious case of persistently relapsing hyperkalemia in an ESRD patient on maintenance hemodialysis following bioprosthetic aortic valve replacement - a potential case for the use of the new agent, patiromer, for hyperkalemia management

Hyperkalemia is not uncommon in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) on maintenance hemodialysis, often related to dietary indiscretion, following the prolonged inter-dialytic weekend interval in patients on thrice weekly hemodialysis treatments, and sometimes the adverse effects of medications such as RAAS blocking agents. Moreover, hyperkalemia following extended cardiac surgery can result from the use of high-potassium containing cardioplegic solutions used during cardiopulmonary bypass. Nevertheless, different from the foregoing, in the nephrology literature, there have been very rare reports of potentially life-threatening hyperkalemia following cardiac valve replacement procedure. We recently encountered an unusual case of persistent relapsing hyperkalemia complicating aortic valve replacement (AVR) in a 53-year-old obese Caucasian male patient despite repeated daily intermittent hemodialysis treatments. Our case report is the first to clearly demonstrate the yo-yo recurrence of newly observed episodes of hyperkalemia reappearing despite repeated treatments.