Prairie Lakes Healthcare System operates three dialysis units in Watertown, SD, Sisseton, SD, and Ortonville, MN. The job of the kidneys is to get rid of waste and excess water in the blood and help restore the chemical balance of the body. If a kidney is damaged, a person would need dialysis to "do the job" of a kidney. Dialysis can also quickly extract toxins or drugs from the system.
Prairie Lakes Kidney Dialysis Statistics:
| Watertown | Sisseton | Ortonville | |
| Year opened | 1973 | 1998 | 2004 |
| Number of patients dialyzed since opening | 495 | 148 | 84 |
| Average treatment time | 3.5 hours | 3.5 hours | 3.5 hours |
| Average years a patient is on dialysis |
5 years (national average) |
5 years (national average) |
5 years |
| Total treatments since opening | 78,624 | 23,868 | 13,728 |
| Average number of patients per year since opening | 12 | 9 | 8 |
| Total number of dialysis hours since opening | 275,184 | 83,538 | 48,048 |
- Other Dialysis Stats:
- Average person has blood volume of 5 liters
- During the average dialysis treatment, the blood volume is cycled 21times through the dialysis machine. In other words, 105 liters of blood is cycled through the machine during an average treatment.
- The average patient dialyzes 156 times a year, and spends 546 hours per year on dialysis.
Prairie Lakes Kidney Dialysis Staff:
Ortonville Staff
Sisseton Staff
Watertown Staff