Having your blood removed, cleaned, and replaced can be an ordeal -- especially when accompanied by a long ride to and from the procedure.

Now, Wareham dialysis patients no longer have to leave town for treatment. Fresenius Medical Care has opened a dialysis center at 100 Rosebrook Way.

Dialysis treatment is for people suffering from kidney failure, and the dialysis machine essentially does what the kidneys are unable to do: cleanse the blood of toxins.

“I used to work at the facility in Mashpee,” said Clinical Manager Carol Lee. “Patients in the Wareham area no longer have to go over the bridge.”

Patient Glenn Galusha of Bourne has been going to dialysis three days per week for three hours a day since 2009.

“You are a little tired [afterwards]. I have coffee or tea, and a bagel to recoup, but some people need a nap," he said.

Galusha, like many dialysis patients, is on a waiting list for a kidney transplant.

“Without dialysis," he said, "we’d be in the hereafter.”

According to Lee, most patients come to treatment three to four times per week, and each treatment takes three to four hours. Patients have their own televisions at their stations, and can bring their own laptops to take advantage of the facility’s Wi-Fi.