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Kidney Stones in American Kids a Painful Trend

Submitted by MedHeadlines on March 29, 2009 – 11:05 am7 Comments
 

American kids are getting more medical conditions once common only in middle-aged adults and the American diet is thought to be largely to blame. The latest, typically adult, diagnosis making the rounds in pediatric wards across the nation is kidney stones.

This painful trend of kidney stones in children was the subject of many conversations at a recent conference of pediatric kidney specialists. Experts acknowledge the number of children getting kidney stones isn’t actually large yet but the rate of diagnosing them has grown rapidly in recent years:

  • In 2005, about 10 children each year were treated for kidney stones at Philadelphia’s Children’s Hospital. Now about five are diagnosed each week.
  • Referrals regarding children with kidney stones has grown at Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins Children Center from one or two a year 15 years ago to new cases every week.
  • The number of children treated for kidney stones at the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Medical Center grew by 500% between 1994 and 2005, when 61 children were treated.
  • One pediatrician at Loyola University Medical Center near Chicago treated an 8-month-old girl after her mother found a pea-size stone in her diaper.
  • No detailed survey of kidney stones in American kids has been formally conducted but anecdotal evidence is abundant.

    Kidney stones are famous for producing excruciating pain often described as more painful than even childbirth. They’re an indication of excess calcium in the urine, a condition often diet related.

    One of the best treatments for kidney stones is to drink lots of water and to minimize salt intake. Parents have reported improvements in their children’s health when salty foods such as cheeseburgers, fries, sausages, ramen noodles, canned goods, chicken nuggets, and pickles were removed from the child’s diet.

    Dr. David Hatch, the Loyola pediatrician treating the 8-month-old baby, recommends at least four cups of water every day for the average 10-year-old, with the amount adjusted according to a child’s size. He also stresses that water means water, not any other beverages a child might consume in addition to adequate water intake.

    Some children require diuretics to increase urination and surgical procedures may be required to remove or dislodge kidney stones in severe cases. As a rule, kidney stones are evidence of nothing more than excess calcium in the urine but they can signal underlying metabolic disorders that require more extensive treatment. The recommendation from the American Academy of Pediatrics calls for metabolic testing on all children treated for kidney stones.

    Some medical experts point to dietary causes as the reason for the rise in pediatric kidney stones but others suggest today’s improved diagnostic techniques are spotting stones that might have gone undetected in years past.

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