[Fungal peritonitis episodes in a peritoneal dialysis centre during a 10-year period: a report of 11 cases].

Fungal peritonitis is a rare cause of peritonitis, but it is associated to poorer prognosis and higher mortality than bacterial peritonitis. Until now, predisposing factors and treatment have not been well established. We retrospectively reviewed all the cases of fungal peritonitis diagnosed for ten years in 218 patients undergoing continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis. In all we detected 11 episodes of fungal peritonitis in 11 patients, that means the 4% of continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis peritonitis. All the cases of fungal peritonitis were caused by Candida species. As a result of fungal peritonitis 36% of the patients died, 55% had to change to long-term hemodialysis because of failure in peritoneal dialysis technique. Only one case (9%) managed to continue peritoneal dialysis. The factors associated with the development of fungal peritonitis were: the presence of antibiotic use within 1 month before fungal peritonitis, patient older than 70 years old, low levels in albumine plasmatic and long permanence in continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis. The treatment consisted in intraperitoneal fluconazol combined with oral 5-flucytosine for 4 to 6 weeks. In the two last cases we associated intravenous caspofungine too. Given that no improvement was seen within 72 hours of treatment, the catheter must be removed in all the cases.