When should kidney stones be operated on?

Kidney stones can be of different sizes and located in different places in the urinary tract. With which, the treatment varies and in some cases requires an operation.

Dr. Ricardo Susaeta Cantín, urologist and director of the Lithiasis Pathology program at the Clínica Chilena Las Condes, points out on the website of this institution that when it comes to small stones that can be expelled and the pain is manageable, it will be appropriate to prescribe a therapy drug that favors spontaneous resolution.

If this does not happen, we will have to think about a type of surgery.

If the compute is hosted on ureterthe tube through which urine descends from the kidney to the bladder, it will be possible to run an endoscopic method, which is minimally invasive.

This variant is also suitable when these formations are located in the kidney. In this case, an endoscopic examination is performed with flexible and very fine instruments, the stone is located and extracted.

When this formation is too large, a laser can be used.

The same note indicates that in these procedures recovery is rapid and very effective.

In other situations, the percutaneous surgery. Susaeta Cantín explains that it is a renal puncture that is performed from behind to access the kidney.

Less invasive but not as effective are shock waves. “A machine that emits this frequency is placed on the patient’s back to fragment the stone and thus allow the spontaneous evacuation of the fragments. Healing is very fast”, concludes the doctor.

What are kidney stones

The Medicine Plus website explains it Kidney stones are solid masses made up of small crystals. Some of them are hereditary. Others may be due to the presence in the urine of certain substances that favor the formation of crystals. After some time, these crystals can turn into stones.

They tend to appear more frequently in men, between the ages of 20 and 30.