Kidney Stone Symptoms and Treatment

Video Title: Kidney Stone Symptoms and Treatment Dr. Richard Bebb, MD, FRCPC, Endocrinologist

Kidney stones can present in a number of ways.  They can be asymptomatic and they can be detected on an ultrasound of the abdomen or on an Xray, or they can present commonly with pain. The pain will often be felt in the flank and will often radiate around the front of the abdomen down to the testicle in men or the labia in women. So pain often comes in a colicky fashion.  It'll be a very severe and bearing like pain and will last sometimes half an hour or an hour and then subside and again will come back as a colicky kind of pain.

You can also present with blood loss with bleeding. Sometimes the stones will cause enough irritation that patients will bleed and sometimes if the stone blocks or obstructs the urinary system, usually the urethra, it can cause an infection which is more of an emergency that you need to have treated.

What to do acutely with this stone depends a lot on the patient. If the stone is small, you're healthy, and you're not having severe pain, you can stay at home with it. Hydrating yourself and drinking lots of fluid and hoping it will pass is usually the first treatment. If however, you've got a large stone with complications such as a blockage of the urinary tract or an infection, or you have other medical problems for example, heart disease or things that make you more fragile if you wish, those patients are generally admitted to hospital until their stones are dealt with.

If you have symptoms of flank pain, blood in your urine or you think you have a kidney stone, discuss this with your family practitioner.

Presenter: Dr. Richard Bebb, Endocrinologist, Victoria, BC

Local Practitioners: Endocrinologist