The outcome of the proximal radial artery arteriovenous fistula

Background: Guidelines recommend placing native arteriovenous fistulas (AVFs) as far distally in the upper extremity as possible. If there are adequate veins and adequate arteries, a wrist fistula, which offers notably lower risks than grafts and catheters, would be the first choice for long-term hemodialysis. With increasing failure and difficulty to create wrist fistulas, we reviewed outcomes of the proximal radial AVF (PRAAVF) and demonstrate that it is an effective technique. Methods: A systemic literature research was conducted in PubMed and related bibliographies. The focus of data extraction was primary failure, primary patency rates, and secondary patency rates after 1 and 2 years. Estimates were pooled with the random effects model, and meta-regression and sensitivity analysis were performed to explore heterogeneity. Results: According to selection criteria formulated a priori, 10 articles (n [ 1310) were included and finally analyzed after screening 1687 articles. The pooled primary failure was 12.3% (95% confidence interval [ CI], 7.6%-17.0%; chi(2) = 70.8, I-2 = 87.3%), the primary patency, including primary failure, was 73.6% (95% CI, 52.4%-94.9%; chi(2) = 71.3, I-2 = 97.2%) at 1 year and 70.5% (95% CI, 50.6%-90.5%; chi(2) = 58.8, I-2 = 96.6%) at 2 years. Secondary patency was 80.0% (95% CI, 72.8%-87.2%; chi(2) = 24.42, I-2 = 75.4%) at 1 year and 73.7% (95% CI, 65.2%-82.2%; chi(2) = 28.51, I-2 = 79.0%) at 2 years. Individual variate meta-regression analysis found the definition of primary failure was a significant source of heterogeneity (P = .009). Steal syndromes developed in four of 832 (0.5%) of the PRAAVFs, and venous hypertension developed in four of 284 (1.4%). Conclusions: The PRAAVF presented low to moderate primary failure and high primary and secondary patency rates with acceptable complications. Consideration of the specific fistula is required when creating a vascular access, especially when a wrist fistula has failed or is predicted to be unsuccessful.