EP 582: How To Stop, Drop, and Roll With Your Kidney Stones

Today, Dr. Mistry and Donna Lee discuss all things kidney stones! If you've ever wondered why you have kidney stones, or whether drinking beer and jumping on a trampoline might cure them, this episode is for you. Dr. Mistry and Donna Lee explain why kidney stones form more often in the summer, how you can prevent them and what to do when one has already formed. Even if your painful stone has suddenly slowed its roll, learn why your kidneys can't pass GO until you've passed that stone!

Voted top Men's Health Podcast, Sex Therapy Podcast, and Prostate Cancer Podcast by FeedSpot!

Dr. Mistry is a board-certified urologist and has been treating patients in the Austin and Greater Williamson County area since he started his private practice in 2007.

We enjoy hearing from you! Email us at armormenshealth@gmail.com and we’ll answer your question in an upcoming episode!

Phone: (512) 238-0762
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Transcript

Speaker 1 0:07

Welcome to the Armor Men's Health Hour with Dr. Mistry and Donna Lee.

Dr. Mistry 0:17

Hello and welcome to the Armor Men's Health Hour. I'm Dr. Mistry, your host, here as always with my ever helpful, awesome, and do-it-yourselfer, co-host Donna Lee.

Donna Lee 0:28

Hey, I think you just gave away that we do a lot of this production in our clinic sometimes.

Dr. Mistry 0:33

Why?

Donna Lee 0:33

I don't know, just the do-it-yourselfer comment, so.

Dr. Mistry 0:35

I think it's more do-it-yourselfer because a lot of times, you do the show without me.

Donna Lee 0:40

I do, because you always have to leave with your six children and one grandchild.

Dr. Mistry 0:45

And, and of course, a busy medical practice.

Donna Lee 0:47

Oh, and you're a surgeon.[Inaudible] that, but you're a little busy. So you know what? I gotta do what I gotta do.

Dr. Mistry 0:51

I'm a board certified urologist. This is a men's health show. It's a show we've been doing for several years now. We've received amazing feedback. People tell us how funny we are. They clearly only listen to the shows that I'm on.

Donna Lee 1:03

That's true. They're not quite as funny when you're not on.

Dr. Mistry 1:07

And then they, then they try to make jokes in the clinic and I'm like,"Listen lady, leave the jokes to me."

Donna Lee 1:11

To you, or to me. The professional.

Dr. Mistry 1:15

The professionals. We love your questions. We love your input. And we of course love to see you as patients in our clinic, NAU Urology Specialists is the clinic started in 2007.

Donna Lee 1:27

And why was it NAU?

Dr. Mistry 1:29

This is, this, it used to be North Austin Urology, but now we're worldwide.

Donna Lee 1:32

That's right. We are Dr. Worldwide featuring Dr. Worldwide. So you can hear us on the other side of the country and world.

Dr. Mistry 1:38

Despite doing this show for so many years and despite assuring people and despite people having Google, they still wonder why I don't give them my real name on the show.

Donna Lee 1:45

That's right. Your fake name is, what? Dr. Mystery?

Dr. Mistry 1:47

Dr. Mistry."I don't know why he doesn't tell us his real name."

Donna Lee 1:51

He wants to stay mysterious.

Dr. Mistry 1:52

That is my real name in case you're wondering out there.

Donna Lee 1:55

M-I-S-T-R-Y.

Dr. Mistry 1:56

That's right.

Donna Lee 1:56

If you're googling.

Dr. Mistry 1:57

That's right. It's a Farsi name. It's Indian, is what it is. In any case.

Donna Lee 2:02

And you're like the least Indian person I know, so there you go.

Dr. Mistry 2:04

Well, there you go. As I go out to my ranch and shoot my AR-10 that was given you by a patient. That's right.

Donna Lee 2:12

It's when you wear your cowboy boots and the scrubs with that cowboy vest to work sometimes.

Dr. Mistry 2:16

That's right. That's right.

Donna Lee 2:16

It's confusing.

Dr. Mistry 2:17

Well, there's 1.8 billion of us. So I'm pretty sure there's a little bit of a variety.

Donna Lee 2:20

That's true. That's true. Okay. Well.

Dr. Mistry 2:23

So, what we discuss on our show are, are a lot of urologic topics, but we have great guests on every so often. We had an awesome guest several weeks ago named Dr. Cassidy, Andrew Cassidy. He's a podiatrist. A spectacular person, and just fitted me for some orthotics for my plantar fasciitis.

Donna Lee 2:45

That's right. You finally dealt with that. Huh?

Dr. Mistry 2:46

I finally dealt with it because I'm going on another a hundred mile hike. I better get my shoes fixed.

Donna Lee 2:50

You hardly survived the first one. So you're going on another one?

Dr. Mistry 2:53

If you have foot problems and you want a great doc, he's a great doc.

Donna Lee 2:55

Dr. Andrew Cassidy. He's in Lakeway.

Dr. Mistry 2:58

Yeah. He did a great...

Donna Lee 2:58

Bee Caves.

Dr. Mistry 2:58

Yeah.

Donna Lee 2:58

Yep.

Dr. Mistry 2:59

A little bit of a drive, but he did a great job for me.

Donna Lee 3:01

Okay.

Dr. Mistry 3:01

So, this time of year, we deal a lot with kidney stones.

Donna Lee 3:06

Why is that?

Dr. Mistry 3:07

Well, although in Austin, throughout the year, but certainly in the summer months, we have lots of kidney stones that we see. Now, most of the time the kidney stones come through the emergency room.

Donna Lee 3:21

Right?

Dr. Mistry 3:22

So the traditional way of dealing with it is you wake up, you're having pain worse than you ever thought, you thought you're dying, and then somebody takes you to the emergency room and they say,"Oh, you have a little bitty kidney stone."

Donna Lee 3:32

Or you're having a baby.

Dr. Mistry 3:35

And you know, it's, the funny part is the size of the stone does not like, it, it doesn't equate with the amount of pain that you have. So people sometimes are like,"Oh, you have a two centimeter stone. That must hurt like, hurt like anything." Well, the two centimeter stone doesn't hurt at all, because it's stuck way up in your kidney. It's not going anywhere. It's that little bitty two millimeter stone that decides to get in your tube and make its way outta you that feels like glass going through your insides.

Donna Lee 4:01

It always makes my tee tee hurt.

Dr. Mistry 4:02

Yes.

Donna Lee 4:02

Even though I don't have a tee tee.

Dr. Mistry 4:03

You do have a tee tee, technically.

Donna Lee 4:05

Well.

Dr. Mistry 4:05

So, the emergency room is how majority of patients deal with stones. And some people think that's the only way you can deal with stones. But to be honest, a clinic like ours, if you have stone pain and you have a history of kidney stones, you should just call urologists and see if we can get you in, because avoiding the ER avoids a lot of costs. A lot of times they do a lot of unnecessary tests. And the delay to get you to the operating room can be significant.

Donna Lee 4:33

Right?

Dr. Mistry 4:34

And so, we would, we encourage people with chronic kidney stones to establish care with a urologist. And if you think you're suffering from one, you know, the emergency room may be a less efficient way. Now, if you're in a lot of pain you need, and it's two in the morning, then I guess...

Donna Lee 4:47

Yeah.

Dr. Mistry 4:48

You go there first.

Donna Lee 4:49

We just had that call earlier, actually. The woman was in tons of pain and she wanted to be seen immediately, but have surgery like right now in the clinic. And we were like,"Oh, we can't do that right at this very moment, but you can come back."

Dr. Mistry 5:02

So, you know, as a, as a layperson, Donna, what do you think we can do for kidney stones?

Donna Lee 5:08

I have, I've always wondered why, I mean, we've talked about it now, but I used to wonder why heat is reflective of more kidney stones. So don't you say kidney stones, that the summer is like Christmas for kidney stones?

Dr. Mistry 5:19

That's right. A urologist's Christmas.

Donna Lee 5:21

Urologist Christmas during the summertime. And especially in Texas, which is so hot.

Dr. Mistry 5:25

Another joke I always like to say is that, you know, there was a time, not today, but there was a time when there were so many urologists that whenever you heard a kidney stone drop, you could hear three urologists shuffling towards the emergency room.

Donna Lee 5:35

Now you hear nothing,'cause there's not enough urologists.

Dr. Mistry 5:37

There's not enough urologists, so.

Donna Lee 5:39

You just hear the guy screaming in pain.

Dr. Mistry 5:40

All you hear is the screaming of the kidney stone pain. But we, what we see lots of kidney stones increasing towards the summer because of dehydration. Now, the formation of kidney stones is simply a chemical process. All the chemicals that cause a stone exist in the urine normally. It exists...

Donna Lee 5:58

Year round.

Dr. Mistry 5:58

It's always there.

Donna Lee 5:59

Doesn't matter how hot it is.

Dr. Mistry 6:01

It doesn't. And so just like when you were in junior high, you did that experiment with salt where you would put more and more and more and more salt in, in water. And then eventually it would crystallize to the bottom of the glass because you had saturated the fluid. So if you've saturated the urine with calcium, calcium oxalate in this case, then it'll come out of solution and drop to the bottom and they can crystallize and form stones. So if you stay hydrated, then it usually is not a problem. Now the big difference is this. In the science experiment, if you put more water in that canister, the, the salt at the bottom would dissolve, but that's not how stones work when they're crystallized. So once you have a stone, it's very difficult to get rid of it with just chemical, chemo dissolution, we call. So taking, you know, your, your mother's remedy or whatever you got off the internet to dissolve a stone, more often than not, it's not gonna work. Once that rock's there, that rock is there.

Donna Lee 7:01

Does jumping up and down help?

Dr. Mistry 7:03

It, it can help. You know, we talk about other things that people can do to get rid of stones on their own. And what we're usually talking about is not taking a stone and making it disappear. We're talking about having a stone that's causing you pain and finding a way to help it get down the tube and out your body.

Donna Lee 7:24

Pushing it through.

Dr. Mistry 7:24

And so that's just gravity. That's just gravity and the wonderful slip and slide ride that is your insides that need to be lubricated with lots of fluid.

Donna Lee 7:33

Oh, there's that rollercoaster that people have talked about. Is it in Disney? It supposedly will, if you're having a kidney stone, you get on the rollercoaster and you, by the time you're done with the rollercoaster, your kidney stone's gonna pass.

Dr. Mistry 7:44

I think a cash pay price for coming and get me to do surgery on you is probably gonna be cheaper than a trip to Disney World.

Donna Lee 7:49

Yeah. Okay. Well, that's true, but maybe not as fun.

Dr. Mistry 7:52

Not as fun.

Donna Lee 7:52

Well, we'll get you a slip and slide though, outside of the clinic, if you come in.

Dr. Mistry 7:56

That's funny. So, if you are suffering from a kidney stone, some things that you can do to help it--it, it does include lots of motion. The uter, the tube that the stone is usually in lives right on a muscle called the psoas muscle. And that psoas muscle is responsible for pulling your knee towards your head. Okay? So flexing your hip.

Donna Lee 8:17

Okay.

Dr. Mistry 8:18

So if, if, if you flex that muscle, it helps kind of, you know, propel things that are in the, the ureter.

Donna Lee 8:25

Does it matter if you're laying down or standing up with the knee to the head?

Dr. Mistry 8:29

Well, if you're lying down, gravity's not helping you with that stone.

Donna Lee 8:32

Well, I didn't know if you pushing...

Dr. Mistry 8:33

So if you're, if you're, if you're struggling from pain from a stone, at least keep standing.

Donna Lee 8:37

Google what gravity is, and then...

Dr. Mistry 8:38

Just stay in the corner and let the wall keep you up because...Google what gravity is.

Donna Lee 8:44

And then you'll just stand up all the time.

Dr. Mistry 8:45

And so the gravity will help that stone come down as well as lots of fluid. The more fluid you drink, the more kind of that water roller coaster has in it to help that stone propel down towards your bladder, and moving, moving, moving, which can be tough. People think beer helps, but you know. Does it ever hurt?

Donna Lee 9:03

You know, it's, it's happy hour sometime, as Johnny Depp says.

Dr. Mistry 9:08

It's five o'clock somewhere.

Donna Lee 9:09

So, you been following that?

Dr. Mistry 9:10

I have not been following it.

Donna Lee 9:11

Oh, okay. For those of you have, that was funny. You're welcome.

Dr. Mistry 9:14

None of the listeners on this radio show.

Donna Lee 9:15

No? OK.

Dr. Mistry 9:16

I can assure you. So, so drinking lots of fluid and staying active are really good things that are going to help you pass a stone. If you have a urologist or go see a physician, oftentimes they'll prescribe a medicine called tamsulosin. It's a medicine classically given to men to help relax their prostate. It works by relaxing the smooth muscle of the prostate gland. And that can help a stone get right out. It's supposed, it's supposed to help right, it's at the very end of the tube, right where it's next to the bladder, like pop out. I think a common misconception that people have is they think it's the last few inches that hurt the most. Like the, these in their mind they think of this piece of shard of glass coming out their urethra as they're peeing.

Donna Lee 10:02

Oh.

Dr. Mistry 10:03

But that part doesn't hurt. It's actually, when you're talk about passing a kidney stone, we're actually talking about the stone making it from the kidney to the bladder, because that uter tube is very thin and very narrow. And if by the time the stone makes it through that, peeing it out's no problem.

Donna Lee 10:18

Really?

Dr. Mistry 10:18

Yes.

Donna Lee 10:19

That's the hard part?

Dr. Mistry 10:19

Yeah. The hard part's already been done. So once it's in your bladder, another thing that people think of is a, that if they think they're passing the stone and they don't have any pain anymore, that that means that they're not in any trouble. But a lot of times stones can get stuck and not cause pain.

Donna Lee 10:34

You have to do some imaging.

Dr. Mistry 10:35

And you have to do some imaging. And the most common imaging we do is a regular x-ray called a KUB or a CAT scan called a stone protocol CAT scan. And, although these things can be inconvenient and somewhat expensive to get, they're used to assure us that the stones have passed. A funny, personal take on kidney stones is your spouse suffered from a kidney stone on your wedding day.

Donna Lee 10:57

In Las Vegas. It was his terrible attempt of getting out of the wedding. And you gave him some tips, and just, but maybe just two...

Dr. Mistry 11:04

Just the tips.

Donna Lee 11:05

Just the tip...two hours before the actual wedding with Elvis involved, his kidney still moved. It didn't pass through, but it moved, and his pain was gone just long enough for us to get married. And then he had pain again the next day.

Dr. Mistry 11:17

He sure did.

Donna Lee 11:18

So explain that a little bit,'cause that happens to a lot of patients. They have their set on, they're gonna have surgery with you, the kidney stone's stuck, you're doing the imaging, and then before you know it, sometimes they call and they're like,"Well it passed. I'm fine." And then sometimes it's just stuck and you have to do surgery.

Dr. Mistry 11:33

Absolutely. So sometimes patients can get confused about why we are worried about stones that don't cause pain and you didn't see it.

Donna Lee 11:43

Right. Because there's no pain...

Dr. Mistry 11:44

Because there's no pain.

Donna Lee 11:45

...to remind them.

Dr. Mistry 11:46

Now, now sometimes you can pee a stone out and not see it, because although you think it's gonna be the size of an elephant, it can be the size of a...

Donna Lee 11:53

It's so tiny.

Dr. Mistry 11:54

It's so tiny.

Donna Lee 11:54

Like the tip of a pin head.

Dr. Mistry 11:56

It's a, it can be a very, very tiny stone that causes lots of pain.

Donna Lee 11:58

No. Some people go home with a little meshy thing, right?

Dr. Mistry 12:02

Yes.

Donna Lee 12:02

To catch the stone?

Dr. Mistry 12:02

That's right.

Donna Lee 12:03

Or sometimes the stone's smaller than the filter?

Dr. Mistry 12:05

Not usually. Not if it's gonna hurt.

Donna Lee 12:07

Okay.

Dr. Mistry 12:08

The filter's pretty fine.

Donna Lee 12:09

Right.

Dr. Mistry 12:09

And so, you'll usually catch it, but, but sometimes people just, don't kind of, they don't want to carry that thing with them everywhere, or to work. And it's got pee on it. Nobody wants to like wash it out. And it's just, it's just not the cleanest and most like, like wonderful thing.

Donna Lee 12:24

It's not sexy for a date. Is that what you're saying?

Dr. Mistry 12:26

Like some people may do it one, for one day, but nobody's gonna carry around a strainer for a week, you know?

Donna Lee 12:30

That's true.

Dr. Mistry 12:31

Unless they're peeing at home all the time. And so...

Donna Lee 12:33

Or it's their fetish.

Dr. Mistry 12:34

So it happens often that patients will feel like they've passed a stone and have not. And so that's why your urologist will probably insist upon some follow up imaging, even though there's a radiation risk and there's all sorts of other risks. But the risk of blocking your kidney without knowing that you're blocking your kidney, it's a lot bigger of a problem. And I deal with that issue once a week, at least. Somebody that had a stone thought it passed, didn't pass, caused blockage of the kidney and caused significant damage to their kidney.

Donna Lee 13:02

What's the damage that can be caused if they don't get it addressed?

Dr. Mistry 13:04

Well, if the kidney's blocked and it's not draining urine, then the body shifts blood flow from that kidney to the other kidney, and then it just dies. The kidney dies. And we see it, we see it very frequently. These nonfunctional kidneys due to long standing obstructing stones.

Donna Lee 13:21

So you're not messing around. If they're, they have no pain, but they probably still have the kidney, kidney stone, they should do something about it.

Dr. Mistry 13:27

Yeah. Now I'm long since gone from listening to myths, but Donna, what are some common things that people say or do when it comes to either getting or preventing a kidney stone?

Donna Lee 13:40

Well, we've had several people approach us, and one of them I thought was, at first I thought it was a silly question, but when I thought about it further and read it, I thought,"Oh, that makes sense." So we had a patient who asked us about mineral water because it's a common discussion that maybe there's minerals that are causing the kidney stones. But he meant actual like Topo Chico. So then at first I thought,"Well, that's kind of silly. Of course Topo Chico doesn't cause minerals or kidney stones." But then I thought what he meant was mineral water, the mineral thing. So is that a myth?

Dr. Mistry 14:06

Yeah, I think that...

Donna Lee 14:07

Can you drink too many minerals?

Dr. Mistry 14:08

As, as a general rule, I think that sparkling water, you know, which most people are gonna associate with that kind of carbonated drink is less, is, is not likely in and of itself to cause more kidney stones. There are sodas that cause kidney stones, and you know, what we, what we mean by that is a couple things. Number one is, drinks that are high in sugar, tend to get us to urinate more and may give us a relative dehydration, which can increase the concentration of certain salts and make our stone burden likely, more likely.

Donna Lee 14:41

Okay.

Dr. Mistry 14:42

But also dark colas have a substance called oxalate in them. And oxalate is the real culprit when it comes to the majority of kidney stones.

Donna Lee 14:52

I haven't seen you drink a soda in a long time.

Dr. Mistry 14:53

Oh, I've been doing better.

Donna Lee 14:55

Proud of you.

Dr. Mistry 14:56

I hide them better[inaudible].

Donna Lee 14:57

From me."Here she comes!"

Dr. Mistry 15:00

The, a lot of people out there think that it's the calcium that's causing kidney stones, when in fact it's not the calcium, it's not the calcium at all. It is the oxalate that binds with, with, with calcium. So some people stop their calcium supplements when they're got kidney stones, and really they're supposed to increase their calcium because that means that the oxalate that we eat that's in our that's in spinach, believe it or not, that's in nuts, that's in colas. If you eat calcium, it binds with the oxalate in your gut and you poop it out.

Donna Lee 15:37

Right.

Dr. Mistry 15:37

But if it, if you have too much oxalate that gets absorbed by your gut, then it will get excreted by your kidneys, bind with calcium in your kidneys, and then form stones.

Donna Lee 15:49

Hmm.

Dr. Mistry 15:49

In fact, the two most important things that you can do to avoid stones are to have a moderate sodium intake...

Donna Lee 15:58

Okay.

Dr. Mistry 15:59

...and to decrease the oxalate that you take in your diet. And the sodium is because when you eat salt, your body has to get rid of extra salt. And the way that our kidneys do it is it gets rid of one salt and one calcium at the same time. So if you eat lots of salt, all of a sudden there's lots of calcium in your urine.

Donna Lee 16:20

Oh.

Dr. Mistry 16:20

And that calcium then will bind with the oxalate and then form stones. So...

Donna Lee 16:25

That makes sense.

Dr. Mistry 16:25

So when we do stone testing or we call stone risk analysis in the clinic, that's some, a, a couple of the most important things we look at--how much sodium is in your urine and how much oxalate is in your urine. Because we're trying to keep you from getting stones, even though it seems like it's against, like, how we make money.

Donna Lee 16:43

Right. Don't you love a stone surgery?

Dr. Mistry 16:45

Yeah. And I love patients that are like,"Doctors are trying to keep me sick so I have to keep paying them."

Donna Lee 16:51

Right.

Dr. Mistry 16:51

I'm like,"Trust me. There's more than enough patients out there."

Donna Lee 16:53

Right.

Dr. Mistry 16:54

"You stay healthy."

Donna Lee 16:55

And a stone surgery isn't really a big...

Dr. Mistry 16:57

You stay, you stay healthy.

Donna Lee 16:59

...a big thing.

Dr. Mistry 16:59

You stay healthy. Well, it's a big thing for the guy getting it.

Donna Lee 17:02

Well, yeah. But for you, you have prostate cancer and all sorts of other things you'd probably like to get to. And, and hopefully that guy just passes his stone.

Dr. Mistry 17:08

Have stones, or doesn't get stones that are that big. A.

Donna Lee 17:10

Another myth is like that, when we talk about people with cancer and the very first thing is,"What do I eat? What do I change?" We have patients that ask that, too."Well, I get stones all the time. What am I eating wrong?"

Dr. Mistry 17:20

Yes. And we can tell you, and there's usually...

Donna Lee 17:21

With the stone risk analysis?

Dr. Mistry 17:23

That's correct. Stone risk analysis. And that's covered by insurance. And we have some amazing providers here in the clinic that are, that are educated and dedicated to help you from, from getting more and more stones. And if you get a stone and you don't pass it, we can also operate on it. And there are three types of operations that we traditionally perform, and people get them all confused.

Donna Lee 17:45

I do. Yeah.

Dr. Mistry 17:46

So, so the biggest procedure that we do, the most invasive procedure that we do, is to go through your back with a tube, and the tube is humongous, and we go into the kidney...

Donna Lee 17:56

Why did you say that out loud?

Dr. Mistry 17:57

It's big. You know here on this, we don't say anything small.

Donna Lee 18:00

Right. Okay.

Dr. Mistry 18:01

There's no small tubes.

Donna Lee 18:01

But still, let's, the one time we talk about a small thing, it's a small tube that goes into your tiny back. So, you have a big back, it's fine.

Dr. Mistry 18:10

Yes.

Donna Lee 18:10

Anyway, back to...

Dr. Mistry 18:11

In any case, so, and this is for big stones, so these are gonna be stones that are over two or three centimeters in size. They oftentimes cause chronic infections. And this is called a PCNL--percutaneous nephrolithotripsy.

Donna Lee 18:24

Oh, I don't see that very often on your schedule.

Dr. Mistry 18:25

We don't put, I don't do very many of them.

Donna Lee 18:27

That's right.

Dr. Mistry 18:27

But, we go through your back. Because they don't happen very often.

Donna Lee 18:31

Yeah. What do you mean through your back? Where in your back?

Dr. Mistry 18:33

Like in your back, underneath your rib cage.

Donna Lee 18:35

Like, you just make a hole in his back, and we just go right in there?

Dr. Mistry 18:37

And we stick a big thing in there. That's right.

Donna Lee 18:38

Oh, that's so...

Dr. Mistry 18:39

You know how much I love surgery. In any case we put a, and we have all these cool tools. We have like a jackhammer. Yes. That works on the stones.

Donna Lee 18:48

No, sir.

Dr. Mistry 18:49

It's it's like, it's like carving out a new street.

Donna Lee 18:51

Oh my gosh.

Dr. Mistry 18:52

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

Donna Lee 18:54

This is, I'm glad I don't see this on your schedule very often. I'm mortified, but continue.

Dr. Mistry 18:57

And so...

Donna Lee 18:58

So that's one.

Dr. Mistry 19:05

That surgery is usually done with an overnight stay.

Donna Lee 19:05

In your back yard?

Dr. Mistry 19:05

No. It's in the garage. Don't be silly. You don't have, I don't have power out in my backyard. It's done in a hospital setting. The second surgery that we do quite commonly is called shockwave lithotripsy, or extracorporeal shockwave lithotripsy. This is similar to the technology that we use for erectile dysfunction and Peyronie's, but it's a lot more powerful and it's done in a hospital setting, and it uses ultrasound that...

Donna Lee 19:27

To break it up.

Dr. Mistry 19:27

...goes through your skin and breaks up a stone, which I still think is magic every time I see it.

Donna Lee 19:31

That is very cool. And I, I, in my head, I hear the little jackhammer noise there.

Dr. Mistry 19:35

There's also, there, it's, there's also a jackhammer noise there, but that's because of the shockwave pulse that gets formed, that, that that's, that gets guided towards the stone.

Donna Lee 19:44

So it breaks it up. And then they, they push it through?

Dr. Mistry 19:46

And you have to pass the little bitty fragments. So...

Donna Lee 19:48

And it, does it hurt?

Dr. Mistry 19:48

...usually those little fragments do not hurt. They're very, very tiny. Those are stones for those are gonna be stones for, those are gonna be for stones that are about maybe six millimeters to a centimeter and a half. Not everybody...

Donna Lee 20:02

That's big.

Dr. Mistry 20:02

Not everybody's a candidate. And the higher up the stone is in the kidney, the more likely it is to work.

Donna Lee 20:08

Okay.

Dr. Mistry 20:09

And then we have a surgery called ureteroscopy where we put a very tiny camera, this is again, magic, the tiny the camera's super tiny. And it goes through your tee tee, and it goes into your bladder up the tube that goes to your kidney, and we can access the entire urinary system through this little tube. We find the stone and we use a little bitty laser to blast it to heck and can use little bitty baskets to take it out. It is super cool.

Donna Lee 20:34

Little bitty baskets?

Dr. Mistry 20:34

Yes.

Donna Lee 20:35

Like little Easter baskets? I have this little...

Dr. Mistry 20:37

Little bitty Easter baskets.

Donna Lee 20:38

...a little visual.

Dr. Mistry 20:38

With, with the worst Easter....

Donna Lee 20:40

Worst egg ever?

Dr. Mistry 20:41

...Easter egg ever. You know?

Donna Lee 20:41

He is risen.

Dr. Mistry 20:41

Kidney stones are terrible...He is, is risen. The stone is risen. It's terrible.

Donna Lee 20:48

The stone is risen.

Dr. Mistry 20:48

The stone is risen. And so those are the surgeries that we do. Rarely, rarely, rarely do we have to do an open surgery nowadays. It's a very special circumstance where we actually have to cut somebody open. So most of the time...

Donna Lee 20:59

When was the last time you had to do that?

Dr. Mistry 21:01

Oh, I think when I did an international trip to India.

Donna Lee 21:04

Really?

Dr. Mistry 21:05

Yeah.

Donna Lee 21:05

Oh. So it's been a minute.

Dr. Mistry 21:07

Yeah. It's been a minute. Like, it doesn't happen very often. And if somebody really needed to do it, we would do it robotically, anyway.

Donna Lee 21:12

Right.

Dr. Mistry 21:13

So if you have kidney stones out there, you wanna learn more about your kidney stones, wanna learn more about how to prevent kidney stones, for those of you that try to prevent them, we use KSP Tabs. KSP. We don't get sponsored by them, but you can buy them on Amazon.

Donna Lee 21:26

Or in our clinic.

Dr. Mistry 21:26

And we should, no we should get sponsored by them.

Donna Lee 21:28

We should, but they're...

Dr. Mistry 21:28

KSP.

Donna Lee 21:29

They're friends of ours.

Dr. Mistry 21:29

They're made by a urologist, a competing urologist.

Donna Lee 21:33

A competing urologist.

Dr. Mistry 21:33

But that's okay.

Donna Lee 21:34

But a nice guy.

Dr. Mistry 21:34

We don't...eh, I wouldn't even go that far. Let's just say the pills are nice.

Donna Lee 21:39

And they come in different flavors.

Dr. Mistry 21:40

How do people get a hold of us?

Donna Lee 21:41

You can call us during the week at 512-238-0762. Our website is armormenshealth.com. Thank you so much for tuning in and be sure to follow us on Facebook and Instagram. Just search Armor Men's Health. Until next time, have a great week!