Renal Calculi

Renal calculi literally translates to kidney stones. These kidney stones form inside your kidneys but can affect your entire urinary tract as it travels (which includes the bladder, urethra, and ureters.) Stones form when urine is too rich with minerals and salts causing them to stick together creating a small, hard, pebble-like sediment. Kidney stones are a collection of proteins and mineral salts that aggregate into a solid crystalline structure. The stones structure is made of two phases, crystalline minerals and non-crystalline organic matrix phases. Renal calculi contains five major types of crystal minerals such as calcium oxalate, calcium phosphate, struvite, uric acid and cystine. Out of these crystals the most common one found in 80% of stones is calcium oxalate. They also contain three major types of non-crystalline organic biomolecules such as proteins, lipids and carbohydrates. Usually the stones pass painfully through urination, unfortunately in other cases surgical treatment is highly recommended when they settle and grow in areas where the urine flow fails to pass correctly. Kidney stones range in size from a fraction of an inch to several inches (a sugar crystal to the size of a ping pong ball.)
Most people with renal calculi won’t even know they have it until pain strikes them. Usually symptoms begin once pain occurs. Kidney stone symptoms start with a discomforting ache in the lower back, it can happen on either side of the body. Eventually this ache becomes a severe sharp pain. Or it can also immediately begin strongly without warning. Kidney stone pain is known to be excruciating, bringing people to tears and knocking them to their knees, literally. Patients compare this pain to a “stabbing” feeling. Another common symptom of the kidney stones is cramping of the back or the lower abdomen and pain in the groin area. Besides pain a common sign of kidney stones is blood in the urine and cloudy urine. Other symptoms include feeling the need to