As Prop. 29 vote looms, dialysis patients brace for change
LOS ANGELES — Socorro Reyes could feel himself getting sleepy as his blood pressure dropped.
He was at his usual Friday morning treatment at a DaVita dialysis center. Reyes had settled into his chair to tune into a religious station to listen to Mass. Before his appointment ended, the dialysis machine started beeping and a technician came over to shift his position and Reyes had to tell them what was happening. He often feels as if the nurses and technicians are not always paying attention.
If a doctor were there, he said, “they would have immediately taken action.”
“I’m really interested in a lot of changes in dialysis clinics, because the treatment at times doesn’t feel adequate,” he said. “Doctors aren’t going to see patients. Some of the technicians only know how to connect us [to the machine]. If someone gets sick, they don’t know what to do.”
For the third time, Californians will have a chance this month to vote on whether to make sweeping changes at dialysis clinics statewide that could affect as many as 80,000 patients. Proposition 29 would require a doctor,
