Brief Summary
This video by Dr. Rena Malik provides a comprehensive overview of kidney stones, covering their formation, symptoms, risk factors, appearance, and how long they take to pass. It emphasizes the importance of hydration, dietary adjustments, and medical evaluation for those at risk. The video also discusses various treatment options and lifestyle adjustments to aid in the passage of kidney stones.
- Kidney stones are common, affecting 1 in 11 adults.
- Hydration is crucial in preventing and passing kidney stones.
- Stone size affects the likelihood and duration of passage.
Dr. Rena Malik introduces the topic of kidney stones, highlighting their prevalence and the common desire to understand their causes and how to get rid of them. She mentions that the video will cover the formation, symptoms, appearance, and passage time of kidney stones. She also invites viewers to subscribe to her channel for more content on sexual and urologic health.
The video discusses several risk factors associated with kidney stone formation. Metabolic abnormalities that affect how kidneys process urine, leading to imbalances in volume and acidity, can increase the risk. Low urine volume due to insufficient fluid intake is a significant risk factor, with the American Urologic Association recommending at least 2.5 liters of fluid daily for stone formers. Dietary factors such as high salt intake, high animal protein consumption, and high oxalate intake from foods like spinach and nuts also contribute to the risk. Environmental factors like living in hot climates or working in high-heat environments can cause dehydration and increase the likelihood of stone formation. Obesity, hypertension, diabetes, and cholesterol issues are also mentioned as conditions that can alter urine pH and increase risk. Additionally, bowel diseases, a personal or family history of kidney stones, and certain medications are identified as potential risk factors.
The video explains that some kidney stones may not cause any symptoms while they remain in the kidney. Pain typically occurs when a stone moves into the ureter, often getting stuck at the ureteral pelvic junction, where the ureter crosses the iliac vessels, or at the ureteral vesicle junction. This blockage can cause pain in the flank, upper back, belly, or even groin. The referred pain in the testicles can occur in men due to shared nerve pathways. Other symptoms include urinary tract infection (UTI) symptoms like blood in the urine, pain during urination, and increased urinary frequency or urgency, especially as the stone nears the bladder.
Kidney stones vary in appearance depending on their composition, with calcium being the most common component. Other types include uric acid stones and cystine stones. The video notes that the appearance can differ significantly based on the stone's specific makeup. Asymptomatic stones may not always require immediate intervention, as only a small percentage of individuals with asymptomatic stones develop symptoms or require procedures within three years. However, these stones can increase the risk of recurrent UTIs, necessitating monitoring by a urologist.
The time it takes to pass a kidney stone depends on its size. Stones 2mm or less take about 8 days on average to pass, but can take up to a month. Stones between 2-4mm take about 12 days on average, but can also take up to 40 days. Stones larger than 4mm can take an average of 22 days to pass, but may also require up to 40 days. About half of those with stones larger than 4mm require a procedure for removal. To aid in the passage of kidney stones, drinking plenty of fluids is crucial. Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like Motrin or Aleve can help by relaxing the smooth muscles of the ureter. Tamsulosin, typically used for enlarged prostates, can also assist. Additionally, sexual intercourse may help due to the release of nitric oxide, which acts as a smooth muscle relaxant.
Dr. Malik encourages viewers to leave comments with specific questions about kidney stones or other urologic conditions. She concludes by reminding everyone to prioritize self-care.
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Transcript
Full transcript of “How long does it take to pass a kidney stone (size matters!) | Prevention, Symptoms, & Looks 👀”. Click a timestamp to open the video at that moment. Need another video? Use the YouTube transcript generator.
0:00 Have you or any of your loved ones ever had a kidney stone? Well, I bet if you've had one you are dying to know how to get rid of them and what causes them, Well, I'm Dr. Rena Malik, urologist and pelvic surgeon, and today I'm going to be talking all about kidney stones and if you want to join our community. I make content about sexual health, urologic health, bladder health, and much much more so make sure if you like what you see here you subscribe and share this channel with your friends so we're going to cover a few things during this video we're going to talk about how kidney stones form what kind of symptoms you might have when you have a kidney stone what kidney stones actually look like and lastly how long does it take to pass a kidney stone so let's get to it kidney
0:49 stones are extremely common about 1 in 11 united states adults will have a kidney stone at some point in their lifetime that's a lot of people and most commonly people get them between the ages of 40 and 60. and so what causes them well there are certainly a number of risk factors or things that are associated with people forming kidney stones you can have some metabolic abnormalities and what that means is it can change the way your kidneys process urine so that you may have a higher volume or lower volume of certain things that can either prevent or promote kidney stones also you can change the acidity either the making it more acidic or more basic of the urine which can change your risk for forming kidney stones so there's no way for you to know if you have a metabolic
1:38 abnormality without seeing a urologist or an endocrinologist and getting a 24-hour urine test and some blood work so if you're concerned that you may have a problem because you keep forming kidney stones make sure you get a full evaluation but let's talk about some of the things that you might be able to change first and foremost and the easiest thing is how much fluid you drink so there are number of studies that have shown that low urine volume meaning not drinking enough fluids which makes less urine puts you at higher risk for getting kidney stones so the american neurologic association recommends that people who form stones drink two and a half liters more of fluid and that has been shown to decrease the incidence of kidney stones in people other things in your diet that might put you at higher risk for kidney stones are having a high salt diet interestingly when
2:29 you eat a lot of salt it actually makes you excrete more calcium in your urine which can put you at a higher risk for forming stones with calcium in them another thing that similarly can another thing that can change the acidity of your urine is having a high amount of animal protein so animal protein creates a higher acid load which then gets converted into your urine being more acidic or having a lower ph which can put you at higher risk of stones and lastly having a high amount of oxalate in your urine which is caused by eating things that have high levels of oxalate in them like spinach rhubarb beets nuts those sorts of things can put you at a higher risk for getting certain types of kidney stones and while i tell people there's a lot of things with
3:17 oxalate in them if you google high oxalate foods you can actually just see if you're having a lot of one of those things and try cutting that back first before trying to radically change your diet other things that are in your environment that can put you at higher risk or if you live in a very hot or dry climate or you work somewhere where you're exposed to high levels of heat this can cause higher levels of dehydration and can make it easier for you to form kidney stones obesity is another big risk factor so being obese or having a body mass index of 30 or higher which you can figure out by going online and putting in your weight and height onto a bmi calculator can put you at risk because it changes the metabolic functions of your body so that you can actually
4:03 have some of those metabolic changes more often in obese people than non-obese people other conditions specifically hypertension diabetes and issues with your cholesterol can also put you at higher risk because it can change the ph of your urine itself other medical problems that can put you at risk are if you have certain types of bowel disease or if you've had kidney stones yourself before or family history of kidney stones and lastly there's a number of medications that are known and associated with kidney stones which you can see listed here so if you've never had a kidney stone before what are the symptoms that you might have well interestingly some people can have kidney stones that are sitting in their kidney that cause them no pain whatsoever typically the pain happens when that kidney stone starts moving down into the ureter or the tube that drains
4:54 the kidney to into the bladder and it usually gets stuck in three major locations one is called the ureteral pelvic junction where the kidney connects to the ureter the second time is where the ureter crosses over these vessels called the iliac vessels where it can get stuck because it gets slightly narrow there and lastly is at the ureteral vesicle junction or where the ureter meets the bladder and that's where it can also get stuck so typically if it gets stuck or causes some blockage of the urine from the kidney because it's too big that's when people will experience pain and the pain can be in the flank or the upper side of the back in the belly or sometimes even in the groin and that's because particularly in men when testicles are formed they're formed inside
5:42 the abdomen and then as they grow in utero when they're babies they drop down into the scrotum and so the nerve fibers for the testicles actually come from the upper part of the abdomen where the ureter is and so sometimes people can feel pain in their testicle but actually have a kidney stone other symptoms that you might notice if you have a kidney stone is symptoms of a urinary tract infection particularly if urine gets blocked by the kidney stone that may cause urine to not move like it normally does which puts you at a higher risk for infection so you might see blood in the urine you might see risk of pain with urination you might feel like you have to go more often or more urgently to urinate particularly if that stone gets down close to the bladder so what do kidney stones look like well kidney stones can look different depending on what
6:31 they're made up of and they can be made up of many different types of compounds most commonly we see calcium in kidney stones but we can also see uric acid stones cystine stones other different types of things that make up kidney stones so you can see they can look very very different depending on what kind of stone you have so what if you don't have symptoms at all are you going to get them well if you look at studies that looked at people who don't have any symptoms about one third of people will get symptoms within that first three years and of that one-third of people maybe half of that smaller group will end up getting a procedure to get rid of their kidney stones so it's a very small percentage of that original pie and so if you're asymptomatic it's very reasonable to continue to watch and observe them for time because they may not become a problem at all
7:19 however sometimes while they won't cause you pain they can put you at risk for recurrent urinary tract infections so make sure that you do see a urologist if you start getting recurrent urinary tract infections or talk to your primary doctor about getting some imaging to make sure you don't have any kidney stones so if you're starting to feel symptoms of a stone how long will it take to pass well that depends on size so that's where we get into size actually does matter so depending on the size of the stone it can take up to 40 days or six weeks to pass a kidney stone but what they found is that in people who have stones two millimeters or less the average time is about eight days but if you look at all people with two millimeter stones it can take up to a month for those stones to pass if they're between two and four millimeters the average time is about
8:10 12 days but if you look at all comers it can take up to 40 days and if they're larger than four millimeters or four to six millimeters it can take on average 22 days to pass those stones but for all comers can take up to 40 days as well but interestingly in that larger group or above four to six millimeters half of those people could not pass the stone so if you have a large stone above four millimeters about half of people will require a procedure to get those stones passed and so very often it makes more sense to go ahead and get a procedure rather than suffer through the pain if you're struggling with trying to pass a kidney stone what can you do to help it pass well the biggest and most important thing you can do is drink a lot of fluids there's also
8:58 some data to suggest that taking non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medications like motrin or aleve or ibuprofen or naproxen can help pass kidney stones because it causes smooth muscle relaxation of the ureter other medications that also do that are something called tamsilosin which is typically used for people with an enlarged prostate there's also some data to suggest that sexual intercourse can help past stones and help with pain relief and the reason being is that when you're having intercourse your body releases nitric oxide and that nitric oxide also acts as a smooth muscle relaxant so if you're up to it try having intercourse it might help you pass those stones all right if you want to learn more specifics about kidney stones or other urologic conditions
9:45 please comment below and as always remember to take care of yourself because you're worth it
