What are stones?
A stone refers to a hard deposit made of minerals and salts that forms inside a certain area of your body, such as your kidneys, bladder, or urethra. Stones often form when the urine becomes concentrated and allows minerals to crystallize and stick together.
What are the symptoms of stones?
Some stones might not cause symptoms until they move around within your kidney or passes into your ureter – the tube that connects your kidney and bladder. At this point, you might experience certain signs or symptoms, such as:
- Severe pain in the back and side
- Pain that radiates to your lower abdomen and groin
- Pain when urinating
- Pink, brown, or red urine
- Foul-smelling or cloudy urine
- Vomiting and nausea
- Frequent urge to urinate
- Chills and fever if there’s an infection
As the stone moves through your urinary tract, the pain caused by the stone might change or increase in intensity or location.
What causes stones?
Stones develop when your urine contains more crystal-forming substances, such as oxalate, uric acid, and calcium, than the fluid in your urine can dilute. Your urine might also lack the substances that prevent the crystals from sticking together.
Most stones are calcium stones that are typically in the form of calcium oxalate. Oxalate is a naturally occurring substance found in your food, and it’s also produced by your liver every day. Some vegetables and fruits, nuts, and chocolate have higher oxalate content.
Struvite stones develop in response to an infection, such as a urinary tract infection. Uric acid stones usually develop in people with gout and in those who don’t drink enough fluids or who lose too much fluid.
It isn’t always clear what causes stones, and multiple factors might play a role, such as:
- High doses of vitamin D
- Metabolic disorders
- Genetics
- Obesity
- Digestive diseases
Intestinal bypass surgery can also increase the concentration of oxalate or calcium in the urine.
How are stones treated?
After various testing, such as urine or blood testing and imaging, and an in-depth consultation, your urologist might suggest certain treatments, such as:
- Medication to help pass your kidney stone
- Healthy lifestyle changes, such as nutritional counseling
- Surgery when necessary
- Ureteroscopy
- Extracorporeal shockwave lithotripsy (ESWL)
- Percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PCNL)
In some cases, you might just need to drink water and rest to pass a kidney stone, but if stones become lodged in the urinary tract and are associated with a urinary infection and causing complications, surgery might be the right solution.
Arizona Urology offers different types of surgical procedures and treatments for stones, including innovative laser technology to vaporize the stones.
Find quality treatment for stones from experienced urologists. Call Arizona Urology.
