With hemo, an artificial kidney is used to clean your blood. The artificial kidney is placed on a machine which helps it do its work. Next, two needles are placed in your arm and hooked to plastic tubes. One tube takes a small amount of blood to the dialysis machine to be cleaned. The other tube returns the cleansed blood to your body. During the treatment, very small amounts of blood are always going to the machine and coming back (returning) into your body. No more than about one cup of blood at a time is outside your body.
blood from your body
artificial kidney cleans blood
clean blood goes back (returns) to your body
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