Does anyone use Zyzatech 700 RO's? We are having problems keeping them within AAMI standards. Any ideas on how to keep them under control. Renalin? Formaldehyde? We need some Ideas ! Thanks

wms,

Please post some further information such as what is listed below and I will see if I can help:

1. How old are the current membranes.
2. Average membrane life.
3. Cleaning schedule.
4. Any chlorine/chloramine breakthrough
5. Tap and Product TDS
6. Percent Rejection
7. Tap and Product AAMI analysis'

quote:

Originally posted by Chuck W:
wms,

Please post some further information such as what is listed below and I will see if I can help:

1. How old are the current membranes.
They are only 9 months old - with minimum use - which we recognize may be part of the problem.!!!!!
2. Average membrane life.
We change them out every 6 months
3. Cleaning schedule.
Renalin every week - yet the cultures/LAL's are above our action levels of cfu's > 50 and LAL's > 1
4. Any chlorine/chloramine breakthrough
NO - we have carbon tanks currently. Going to get rid of them (? problem) and getting carbon filters
5. Tap and Product TDS
Usually < 5 [? tap TDS?)
6. Percent Rejection
95% or greater
7. Tap and Product AAMI analysis'

Tap water AAMI - Na and Nitrate-Nitrogen are only chemistries out of range

Product analysis are all within range

Problem is the microbial testing. We have been told that the Portable R/O's need to be run every day. Well, how do you accomplish this in the home setting if the pt goes on vacation or is hospitalized? How about the acute setting in a hospital where no dialysis occurs for 1-2 weeks? Let me know if you have any suggestions.

Any comments regarding Renalin versus Formadehyde? or Biosans????


Thank you

wms

wms,

I apologize, I assumed you meant that chemically you were above AAMI standards.

With our acute machines, unless we know for certain that they will be used the next day, they are filled with a 2% Renalin solution which dwells until the next time the machine is used or for 1 week, which ever comes first.

What is the life of your membranes, what type of membrane do you use?? We use thin film. We have been told that you can't dwell renalin for more than 12 hours??? Thanks so much, WMS

wms,

We use TFC also and they usually last about 2 years with quarterly cleanings. The main thing that will influence the life of the membranes is hardness. Here, our water is realatively soft (3 gpg). I have not heard of a mixumum dwell time though a word of caution with using Renalin, if you have even a moderate amount of iron in your water you must do a cleaning of the membranes before you put Renalin in the machine. The Renalin will ionize the iron that is adheared to the membranes and destroy them.

We have used both the Zyza 703 and 704 portable RO. As long as you disinfect the membranes routinely, then the membranes should last 2 years at least. The TFC membranes that are used in these units hold up well to cleaners. So depending on how hard your water is you may want to increase the frequency of cleaning. Rather than using a PAA solution and dwelling for a week,a better approach might be to instill a 10% citric acid solution at the end of each treatment day. This will displace the water in the membranes,and while not disinfecting will help inhibit the bacterial growth. The citric acid solution can be left in the unit for a week or until the next treatment. When taking cultures let the RO run for at least 10 minutes and until the TDS has stabilized, and also disinfect the end of the product hose prior to culturing,since this end is usually on the floor of a contaminated hospital room under a patient bed. Make sure any disinfectant is rinsed from the end of the hose,then using a sterile container,or a Millipore if you must take a clean catch and incubate it. We had 10 portable RO's,which were busy in various hospital locations,most were used at least every other day. Sometimes when the patient census was down some would sit for an extended period. We kept up with the disinfecting routine, paying particular attention to the culturing technique, which alleviated many problems.