Table of Contents
Table of Contents

Urolithiasis (Kidney Stones)

Kidney stones are hard, pebble-like pieces of material that form in one or both of your kidney when high levels of certain minerals are in your urine. Kidney stones rarely cause permanent damage if treated by a health care professional.

Kidney stones vary in size and shape. They may be as small as a grain of sand or as large as a pea. Rarely, some kidney stones are as big as golf balls.

Kidney stones may be smooth or jagged and are usually yellow or brown. A small kidney stone may pass through your urinary tract on its own, causing little or no pain. A larger kidney stone may get stuck along the way. A kidney stone that gets stuck can block your flow of urine, causing severe pain or bleeding.

Do kidney stones have another name?

The scientific name for a kidney stone is renal calculus or nephrolith. You may hear health care professionals call this condition nephrolithiasis, urolithiasis, or urinary stones.

Type of kidney stones

You probably have one of four main types of kidney stones. Treatment for kidney stones usually depends on their size, location, and what they are made of.

Calcium stones

Calcium stones, including calcium oxalate stones and calcium phosphate stones, are the most common types of kidney stones. Calcium oxalate stones are more common than calcium phosphate stones.

Calcium from food does not increase your chance of having calcium oxalate stones. Normally, extra calcium that isn’t used by your bones and muscles goes to your kidneys and is flushed out with urine. When this doesn’t happen, the calcium stays in the kidneys and joins with other waste products to form a kidney stone.

Uric acid stones

A uric acid stone may form when your urine contains too much acid. Eating a lot of fish, shellfish, and meat—especially organ meat—may increase uric acid in urine.

Struvite stones

Struvite stones may form after you have a UTI. They can develop suddenly and become large quickly.

Cystine stones

Cystine stones result from a disorder called Cystinuria that is passed down through families. Cystinuria causes the amino acid cystine to leak through your kidneys and into the urine.

Causes of Kidney Stones

Complications of kidney stones are rare if you seek treatment from a health care professional before problems occur.

If kidney stones are not treated, they can cause:

  • hematuria, or blood in the urine
  • severe pain
  • UTIs, including kidney infections
  • loss of kidney function

Signs and Symptoms

You are more likely to develop kidney stones if you have certain conditions, including

  • a blockage of the urinary tract
  • chronic, or long-lasting, inflammation of the bowel
  • cystic kidney diseases, which are disorders that cause fluid-filled sacs to form on the kidneys
  • cystinuria
  • digestive problems or a history of gastrointestinal tract surgery
  • gout, a disorder that causes painful swelling of the joints
  • hypercalciuria, a condition that runs in families in which urine contains unusually large amounts of calcium; this is the most common condition found in people who form calcium stones
  • hyperoxaluria, a condition in which urine contains unusually large amounts of oxalate
  • hyperparathyroidism, a condition in which the parathyroid glands release too much parathyroid hormone, causing extra calcium in the blood
  • hyperuricosuria, a disorder in which too much uric acid is in the urine
  • obesity
  • repeated, or recurrent, UTIs
  • renal tubular acidosis, a disease that occurs when the kidneys fail to remove acids into the urine, which causes a person’s blood to remain too acidic

Ayurveda Treatment for Kidney Stone

Urolithiasis is the stone formed in urinary tract (kidney, ureter, bladder, and urethra). Synonym for Urolithiasis is urine stone/calculi. In Ayurveda, it is known as Ashmari which means calculi or stone and its small powder like pieces are known as Sharkara or Sikatai.e. gravels. Classical Ayurveda explains two process of stone formation. One is by the stagnation and super saturation of the urine and other by crystallization of the crystalloids in the urine.

Various herbal formulations are mentioned in classical texts and are found effective till today. Specific group of drugs are mentioned on basis of type of stone on its Doshas combinations. Urine stones are classified on basis of doshas – Vata, Pitta, Kapha etc and treatment is mentioned accordingly. The drugs like Varuna, Pashanabheda, Trinapanchamoola, Gokshura, Punarnava, Apamargakshar, Chandraprabhavati etc. are advised to be administered either in form of decoctions, fermented solutions, powder, cold infusions etc or in form of dietary products like cooked rice, gruel etc. Stones which are too large and not responding to medicinal treatment should be extracted surgically and for this Sushruta, the text book of Ayurveda Surgery had mentioned perineal approach to remove the stone.

Our Approach

Ayurveda understands the imbalances of Doshas, primarily: Kapha Pitta and Vata to an extent, in presence of an imbalanced agni will vitiate the dhatus/tissue and lead to Granthi/Cystic formation.

AyurVAID’s Evidence Based Approach

The Apollo AyurVAID protocol is based on the simple premise that the Physician must diagnose and treat only based on sufficient evidence. This evidence should be ‘patient or rogi based’ in addition to being ‘disease or roga based’ in accordance with the fundamental principles of Ayurveda.
How is this made possible?
  • A thorough and complete recording of the patient’s medical history, capturing every minute aspect of his/her lifestyle.
  • A thorough head-to-toe clinical examination, uncovering health risk factors that the patient is unaware of, directly connected or unrelated with his presenting medical complaint(s).
  • This process of detailed history recording and clinical examination- which includes the classical Srotha-Vikrti pariksha – leads to an accurate understanding of the Dosha status of the individual and lays the foundation for an accurate differential diagnosis and medical management.
  • Further, the patient is entitled to be clearly informed about the diagnosis arrived at, as also understand the medical management proposed for him. The Physician shall proceed only with the patient’s informed concurrence.

Other Related Disease

*Outcome may vary from patient to patient

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