Re: yesterday (kidney stones)

[Guest guest]

Hello, Pat:

I am a medical amateur, but I can tell you that between 2001 and 2004, I had

SEVEN episodes of actually passing kidney stones. Mine were uric acid

crystal ones (much less common than the calcium ones). I finally found a

urologist who got them under control, and no episodes since. Allopurinol

(prescription drug) is an important component, because it helps diminish the

production of uric acid. Also, I have to take potassium in fairly large

doses.

However, on the upside - I should never suffer from gout, so long as I am on

this regimen, and no worries about the GRDS resulting in potassium shortages

- I was already taking extra.

Allopurinol's discoverer recently died (old age), but when my brother-in-law

began to suffer from gout - I suggested he talk to his PCP about the drug.

He did, it was in the end, prescribed, and he hasn't suffered from gout

again.

The pain of passing a stone is EXTREMELY intense. At least five of the

times I did it, I had to do it in a hospital emergency room while on a

morphine drip. Other times I took Percoset at home and tried to sleep

through it. One symptom was always pain severe enough to cause vomiting.

Here's my favorite story about myself and kidney stones:

I actually went by Metro (subway) one night to one of the local teaching

hospitals while in the throes of a kidney stone. So long as you are

breathing and moaning, and rocking, they know you at least aren't dying, so

in an urban area like Washington DC, they often don't get around to treating

you for HOURS. You by then are BEGGING for morphine.

Anyway, after an endless stream of residents, each with a clipboard, and

each taking my history once again, I finally got the drip. I was asleep on

the gurney, when the final resident came in. He started out asking me my

name, and as my mind floated to the surface, I honestly COULD NOT REMEMBER

my name. But I wanted to tell him something, so a little devil made me do

this: I told him my name was " Ted Bundy. " He DID look surprised, and I

didn't offer to change my answer, so he left.

Sonja Sweek

GRDS 11/29/06

-110 lbs and holding

Size 24>Size 14

......After Michell I got scared about the bowles,they

did a urine test and it is kidney stones.

Dee thanks for calling me back I was able to tell the pa

that I had crystals in the urnine...

[Guest guest]

Hi Pat

I have had surgery to remove kidney stones (about 2 years post-op). I sure

hope yours 'sort' themselves out. I remember the stones themselves, while

painful, were not horrendous but the post-op pain was awful - they go in

thru your urethra to get the stones out!!

This is why I have to stop drinking Coke again.... thanks for the reminder.

Kristy