Cognitive evaluations of water, urges to drink, and fluid intake in patients with kidney stones.

Increasing fluid intake is a core recommendation for reducing risk of kidney stone recurrence. Thirst is often insufficient to motivate the volume of intake recommended to reduce risk, so this study examined cognitive and affective processes that support fluid intake (water and flavored beverages). Patients (N = 230) with a history of kidney stones identified from medical records were recruited to complete an online survey.

A Patient-Prioritized Research Agenda for Clinical Trials in Kidney Stone Disease.

Purpose: To ensure that research on kidney stones provides meaningful impact for the kidney stone community, patients and caregivers should be engaged as stakeholders in clinical trial design, starting at study inception. This project aimed to elicit, refine, and prioritize research ideas from kidney stone stakeholders to develop a patient-centered research agenda for clinical trials.

Materials And Methods: The Kidney Stone Engagement Core, a group of patients, caregivers, advocates, clinicians, and researchers, executed an iterative process of surveys and focus groups to elicit and refine research themes, which were then translated into research questions.

Case of drug-induced kidney stone from overuse of phenazopyridine.

Drug-induced nephrolithiasis represents only 1%-2% of stone cases. Here we focus on drugs capable of crystallizing and forming stone, specifically phenazopyridine (Pyridium/Azo). This is a case of a patient who presented with a stone conglomerate in the right proximal ureter and underwent definitive treatment.

Promoting fluid intake to increase urine volume for kidney stone prevention: Protocol for a randomized controlled efficacy trial of the sip intervention.

Background: Risk of kidney stone recurrence can be reduced by increasing fluid intake and urine production but most patients fail to adhere to recommended clinical guidelines. Patients have indicated that common barriers to fluid intake include a lack of thirst, forgetting to drink, and not having access to water. We developed the sip intervention to support patients' fluid intake with semi-automated tracking (via a mobile app, connected water bottle and a smartwatch clockface that detects drinking gestures) and provision of just-in-time text message reminders to drink when they do not meet the hourly fluid intake goal needed to achieve the recommended volume.

Leveraging behavioral modification technology for the prevention of kidney stones.

Purpose Of Review: The purpose of this review is to examine the use of technology to help promote and maintain behaviors that decrease stone recurrence.

Recent Findings: Behavior change is a complex process with various interacting components. Recent developments have sought to utilize technology in combination with behavioral change techniques to promote behavior that lowers stone recurrence risk.

The Impact of Bilateral Stone Disease on Patients' Disease Progression and Health-Related Quality of Life.

Patients with recurring kidney stone events can expect significant morbidity and functional impairment. Few studies have evaluated the effect of bilateral kidney stones on disease progression and quality of life. We wanted to determine the association of bilateral stone disease on age of onset, and the impact on number of stone events and individual kidney stone disease-specific health-related quality of life (HRQOL) by analyzing the validated and prospectively collected Wisconsin Stone Quality of Life (WISQOL) database.

Perceptions and Practice Patterns of Urologists Relating to Intrarenal Pressure During Ureteroscopy: Findings from a Global Cross-Sectional Analysis.

To explore beliefs and practice patterns of urologists regarding intrarenal pressure (IRP) during ureteroscopy (URS). A customized questionnaire was designed in a 4-step iterative process incorporating a systematic review of the literature and critical analysis of topics/questions by six endourologists. The 19-item questionnaire interrogated perceptions, practice patterns, and key areas of uncertainty regarding ureteroscopic IRP, and was disseminated via urologic societies, networks, and social media to the international urologic community.

Feasibility of Mini sip Behavioral Intervention to Increase Urine Volume in Patients With Kidney Stones.

Objective: To determine the feasibility and acceptability of mini sip, a context-sensitive reminder system that incorporates a connected water bottle and mobile app with text messaging, for kidney stone patients who have poor adherence to increasing fluid intake for prevention.

Methods: Patients with a history of kidney stones and urine volume <2L/d participated in a 1-month single-group feasibility trial. Patients used a connected water bottle and received text message reminders when fluid intake goals weren't met.

The Duration of Stone Disease and the Impact of a Stone Event on Patients' Quality of Life.

With a 5-year stone recurrence rate of 30% to 50%, kidney stone formers are subject to significant morbidity that negatively impacts their health-related quality of life (HRQOL). We sought to determine the impact of age at kidney stone onset, duration of stone disease, and kidney stone event (surgery or stone passage) on HRQOL of individual patients by querying the validated and prospectively collected Wisconsin Stone Quality of Life (WISQOL) database. Cross-sectional data were obtained from a total of 2438 kidney stone formers from 14 institutions in North America who completed the WISQOL questionnaire during the period from 2014 to 2019.

Advances in ureteral stent technology.

Purpose Of Review: Ureteral stents are an invaluable tool for urologists but suffer from several drawbacks, including: limited durability due to stent encrustation, significant morbidity from bothersome urinary symptoms, pain and infection, risk of the forgotten stent and costly removal. This review highlights key advances in ureteral stent technology that seek to address these issues.

Recent Findings: Over the past 2 years clinical trials have brought ureteral stent technology aimed to reduce stent-associated morbidity closer to clinical application.

Quality of Life of Urolithiasis Patients During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Multi-Institutional Cross-Sectional Study.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is an unprecedented global event that has caused significant fear and anxiety across all populations. To date, there have been no studies on how major health crises have affected the stone-related quality of life (QOL) of urolithiasis patients. In this multi-institutional study, we investigated the association between fear of COVID-19 and the QOL of urolithiasis patients during the COVID-19 pandemic using the Fear of COVID-19 Scale (FCV-19S) and the Wisconsin Stone Quality of Life (WISQOL) questionnaires.

Use of prescription drug monitoring program to audit opioid prescribing patterns for patients with symptomatic nephrolithiasis.

Unlabelled: INTRODUCTION The opioid epidemic is a growing problem in the United States. There is a high rate of opioid oversupply for treatment of symptomatic nephrolithiasis, partly due to patients being seen by multiple providers. In Pennsylvania, there are efforts to integrate a prescription drug monitoring program (PDMP) within the electronic medical record (EMR).

How I Do It: Modification of technique to safely position patients with super obesity in dorsal lithotomy for ureteroscopic management of kidney stones.

Obesity is a known risk factor for recurrent nephrolithiasis and it can be challenging to provide safe surgical intervention in the super obese population. Despite high weight limits on surgical beds, these often do not take into account positioning the patient on the end of the bed for dorsal lithotomy, which can risk an unsteady bed. In addition, depending on patient habitus the leg stirrups may not accommodate.

Is Stone-free Status After Surgical Intervention for Kidney Stones Associated With Better Health-related Quality of Life? - A Multicenter Study From the North American Stone Quality of Life Consortium.

Objective: To compare the health-related quality of life (HRQOL) of patients with residual fragments after surgical intervention for kidney stones to patients that are stone-free using the disease-specific Wisconsin stone quality of life (WISQOL) questionnaire. Kidney stones contribute to impaired HRQOL, which is increasingly recognized as an important healthcare outcome measurement.

Materials And Methods: With institutional review board approval, 313 adult patients who underwent surgical intervention for kidney stones at 4 sites completed a WISQOL questionnaire.

Just-in-time adaptive intervention to promote fluid consumption in patients with kidney stones.

Objective: Kidney stones are painful and costly. Prevention guidelines emphasize a simple behavior change: increasing fluid intake and urine output. Unfortunately, adherence to those prevention guidelines is limited, and patients report forgetting or not being thirsty enough.

Estimating the health-related quality of life of kidney stone patients: initial results from the Wisconsin Stone Quality of Life Machine-Learning Algorithm (WISQOL-MLA).

Objective: To build the Wisconsin Stone Quality of Life Machine-Learning Algorithm (WISQOL-MLA) to predict urolithiasis patients' health-related quality of life (HRQoL) based on demographic, symptomatic and clinical data collected for the validation of the Wisconsin Stone Quality-of-Life (WISQOL) questionnaire, an HRQoL measurement tool designed specifically for patients with kidney stones.

Material And Methods: We used data from 3206 stone patients from 16 centres. We used gradient-boosting and deep-learning models to predict HRQoL scores.