Hemodialysis as a treatment for infantile autism.

Doctors tried hemodialysis on one child with autism. They wanted to see if cleaning the blood would change behavior.

The team watched mood, talk, and thinking before and after treatment. They ran the dialysis for an unstated time.

Nothing changed. The child acted the same after dialysis as before.

No gains showed up in mood, behavior, or cognition. The case report lists the idea as a dead end.

Shi et al. (2026) later pooled many diet trials and found small but real gains with Vitamin D. Their big umbrella review covers the same autism group but tests mild pills, not invasive machines.

Castells et al. (1979) is a close cousin. That single case also hunted a metabolic cause for autism, looking at blood histidine instead of dialysis. Both papers share the same weak design: one child, no control.

Katz et al. (2003) warns that cutting foods can starve kids of brain-building amino acids. The 1980 dialysis paper and the 2003 diet study both chase biochemistry, yet only the later work shows a clear risk families should watch.

You can now skip any parent asking about blood-cleaning machines. Point them to safer nutrition options like Vitamin D that show small, proven gains instead. Save your clinical hours for evidence-based choices.