IN 2007, an international panel convened by the American Urological Association (AUA) and the European Association of Urology (EAU) updated the AUA ureteral stone guidelines. Most notably, the new guidelines reflect a pragmatic addition to the urologist's armamentarium: medical expulsive therapy (MET). MET is defined as the use of pharmaceutical agents to improve urinary stone passage rates and the time to stone passage in select individuals.

USE OF shockwave lithotripsy (SWL) for proximal ureteral stones can be expanded to stones up to 15 mm in diameter with acceptable success rates, researchers in Iran conclude.

NEW FINDINGS challenge a prevailing belief that higher urine uric acid excretion increases the risk for calcium oxalate stone formation, according to researchers.

SAN FRANCISCO—By drinking more water, especially during the night, calcium stone formers may reduce their stone risk, according to a study presented here at Renal Week 2007.

HIGH LEVELS of fructose intake are independently associated with an increased risk of kidney stones, according to researchers.

URETEROSCOPY (URS) is appropriate for the surgical treatment of ureteral stones regardless of their location in the ureter, according to a new guideline document developed by a panel convened by the American Urological Association (AUA) and the European Association of Urology (EAU).

The established practice for preventing urinary calculi is being challenged by results of a recent study (Whitson et al, Urology. 2007;70:634-637), which showed no correlation between urinary citrate levels and urinary pH.

SAN FRANCISCO—Significant gender differences need to be taken into account when making therapeutic decisions to prevent kidney stone recurrences, according to Canadian researchers. Women are less likely than men to form pure calcium oxalate stones and more likely to form phosphate-containing stones, either as a primary stone or in trace amounts, they showed.

UNTIL RECENTLY, there was little interest in food oxalate values, as the dominant paradigm was that dietary oxalate contributed only 10% of daily oxalate excretion. This changed when Ross P. Holmes, PhD, of Wake Forest University School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, N.C., and his colleagues reported that 24% to 53% of urinary oxalate originated from dietary oxalate at typical intakes of 10-250 mg/day (Kidney Int. 2001;59:270-276).

Extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy (ESWL) monotherapy is associated with similar outcomes in patients with proximal and distal ureteral stones, according to researchers.