Anybody know any tried & true ways to deal with kidney stones?

[julius kelp]

TIA

[tuberman]

If you've already been diagnosed with kidney stones, it's usually best to go get the laser treatment to get rid of them.

Several years ago I suspected I might have had the beginnings of stones so I took a "natural cure." It was half a cup or about 5 oz of pure lemon juice from fresh lemons capped off with several ounces of extra virgin olive oil -- drunk down all at once. Yep, I did have stones, and the "natural cure" did work. I went through excruciating pain for a couple of days or more while the stones took their time to break up and come out.

This lemon juice and extra virgin olive oil is a good way to prevent stones from coming back, but not so good for getting rid of stones when you know you already have them. It may send you to the emergency room as it has with a number of other people that I've read about after my experience.

[huxley309]

I have a friend that suffers with this, and his advice is to drink water, and lots of it.

And to keep away from electrolytes if possible.

[DrDave]

I feel for you with kidney stones! In June of 2010 I woke up about 5AM with the worst pain I've ever had! I'm a comabt wounded vet, Panama and again during the Gulf War. I've been through 3 lower back surgeries, a couple of hernia repairs, etc. NOTHING hurts as bad as a kidney stone! And don't think the obvious, they don't hurt when you expell them, the real pain is when they are ripping and gouging your ureter as they descend from your kidney to your bladder. I felt like someone had run me through just below my ribs. After I threw up a few times, I let my wife drag me to the ER. The nurse knew exactly what was going on, said she has had them herself. She told me kidney stones hurt worse than labor pain!
So, they shot me full of delaudid. A whopping 2mg dose along with some phenergan for the nausea. In a few minutes the delaudid washed over me, (great stuff) and they came back and asked if I was still in pain. My answer was yes, I could still feel it, the pain was no longer acute, but I really didn't care! (did I mention delaudid is great stuff?)
They gave me the standard paint filter to catch the stone, but I was never able to.
I produced them, one a month, for 6 months in a row! I was a regular in the ER. They take you to imaging to verify you have stones. I was never able to catch one, never noticed passing one ever. One time I was in my office and felt one start. I drove home and laid down and roughed one out. That took about 4 hours and wore me out! Stupid on my part, call it the Army training.. Hoo-rah!
Because I was never able to catch one, we were never able to analyize a stone and determine a probable cause.
I took water samples to my lab, tried culturing samples, microscopy, the works, but never found anything remarkable.
About 6 months later my town got letters in the mail from our local County water authority. (remember the droughts in GA in 2010?)
The letters announced that since the water table was so low, they were unable to stir the water tanks as regularly as required, and that the mineral content was higher than standard. Well, it's possible that could have been the cause, also possible it had nothing to do with it either.
Here's what I have done since. I drink diet drinks, studies lend some truth that diet drinks help stave off stones. Similarly some homeopathic studies show lemon juice or lemonade seems to help. I drink powdered drink mixes and now I only use filtered water, no more straight from the tap. Thanks to the Army forcing us to hydrate ever 40 minutes I the desert, I loathe plain water. Especially out of a plastic bottle!!!
I noticed where some people are talking about taking olive oil for kidney stones. That not even systemically related. The Olive Oil was an old school of medicine treatment for GALL Stones, not Kidney Stones. Olive Oil, 2 tablespoons, was administerd orally to cause the gall bladder to constrict, forcing trapped stones to be blown into the small intestine. The problem was, that if the gall bladder was already inflamed, or the blockage too large, the organ would rupture, requiring immediate surgery. So olive oil isn't such a great idea. There was an old medical professor that swore by drinking a shot of half and half I his daily coffee. He claimed that would keep the gall bladder cleaned out regularly. Especially for those of us moving to low fat diets. The old school of thought for gall bladder problems is "fair, fat, forty." Fair skin, overweight, over 40.
Sorry for rambling on folks.
Kidney stone cure.. There are OTC products that are supposed to take the spikes and jagged edges off the stones, allowing for easier passage. You really need to catch one and have it analyzed to determine the probable cause. Then you may be able to prevent future problems by eliminating the cause.

[HokiePride]

Lithotripsy. I used to be technician for TRT <Tissue Regeneration Technologies>. Painless surgery, the litho breaks up the kidney stone and when you wake up, you actually pass it as granules. Look up the company. They sell the machines to hospitals. Most hospitals have them now.

[schismal]

Lithotripsy.

This, if drinking lots of water doesn't help.

[Vis]

Kidney stone caused me to stop drinking coffee and eating nuts! Very painful multi week ordeal. 7mm x 10mm stone. Blasting it out is the only way for the big stones - Lithotripsy. The cost is $4000-6000. Do you know the size of your stone?

[Bubbagump]

I just went through it. Drinking lots of water seemed to help me. Also, wife made me drink a bunch of lemonade.

[Spartan666]

a gallon a day of pure organic not from concentrate cranberry juice for 3 days straight with nothing else to eat.....then for the following 3 days eat and drink only watermelon....no food or water.

Then you're done....your kidneys are back to the state they were before.....eat healthy for the next 30 days....easy on the protein, alcohol, and no electrolytes.....drink steam distilled water preferably.