OBJECTIVES: This study was conducted with the purpose of search evidence in terms of the efficacy and safety that to demonstrated advantages of any of the renal replacement therapy in terms of peritoneal dialysis (PD), hemodialysis (HD) and kidney transplant (KT) , used in patients with chronic kidney failure.

METHODS: The systematic review was performed in PubMed, Cochrane Library, and LILAC’s using Cochrane Methodology. Only randomized clinical trials were included if they were evaluating survival and quality of life in adult patients with chronical kidney disease and that were under one of the renal replacements therapy were included. PRISMA tool was used to evaluate quality of these studies.

RESULTS: Of the 4,472 studies, only 3 were chosen. 2 studies evaluate DP vs HD (Korevaar JC, 2003; Gutman RA, 1984), where after 48 months no significant differences were demonstrated in survival between both treatments (0.57% in both groups), whereas in third study (Bakewell AB, 2001) evaluate quality life in patients , where a higher level in quality life was reported in patients with PD than in those who received HD (76± 20% vs 65 ± 19%) respectively, however, while evaluating the therapy with KT using the tool KDQOL-36, it was observed that this therapy better comparison with PD and HD in what concerns to mental health (82 ±17 vs 65±20 vs 53±24),physical health (65 ±28 vs 40±22 vs 45±18) and patient’s satisfaction (84±16 vs 66±18 vs 78±19). Finally, not adverse events were reported for neither of the substitutive treatments. Population consist 212 patients distributed 99 PD, 93 HD.

CONCLUSIONS: Non randomized clinical trials were found for evaluating efficiency in patients with KT in terms of survival. However, evidence point that substitutive treatments are equivalent, whereas, in quality of life, KT represents the biggest clinical benefit in patients with chronic kidney disease.