Related Experiment Videos
Inhibitors of stone formation in hypercalciuric children with and without stone disease
A al-Qadreh1, H Athanasopoulou, I Voskaki
1Institute of Child Health, Ag. Sophia Children's Hospital, Athens, Greece.
Insights
Hypercalciuric children, both stone formers and non-stone formers, show lower urinary citrate levels compared to controls. Magnesium levels did not differ significantly between groups.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Nephrology
- Urology
- Biochemistry
Background:
- Urinary stone formation is a significant health concern in children.
- Citrate and magnesium are key inhibitors of urinary stone formation.
- Hypercalciuria is a known risk factor for pediatric kidney stones.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the urinary excretion of citrate and magnesium in hypercalciuric children.
- To compare stone inhibitors between children who form stones and those who do not.
- To identify potential differences in stone inhibitor excretion related to hypercalciuria.
Main Methods:
- Collected and analyzed urinary citrate and magnesium levels.
- Compared excretion rates between hypercalciuric children (stone formers and non-stone formers) and healthy controls.
- Calculated and compared Magnesium/Calcium (Mg/Ca) and Citrate/Calcium (Citrate/Ca) ratios.
Main Results:
- No significant differences in urinary citrate or magnesium output were found between controls and hypercalciuric children.
- The Mg/Ca ratio was significantly lower in hypercalciuric children compared to controls.
- Both non-stone former (NSF) and stone former (SF) groups exhibited a significantly lower Citrate/Ca ratio than controls, with SF having a lower ratio than NSF.
Conclusions:
- Urinary citrate levels are reduced in hypercalciuric children, irrespective of stone formation history.
- The lower citrate/calcium ratio in stone formers suggests a potential role in stone pathogenesis.
- Magnesium excretion did not significantly differ, but the Mg/Ca ratio was lower in hypercalciuric children.
Abstract:
The extretion of two inhibitors of urinary stone formation (citrate, magnesium) was evaluated in 71 hypercalciuric children and 50 controls. Patients were classified into two groups: 42 nonstone former (NSF), 22 boys and 20 girls, 3-14 years old, and 29 stone formers (SF), 18 boys and 11 girls, 2.5-18 years old. Our study was unable to show significant differences in magnesium and citrate urinary outputs between controls and patient groups. The Mg/Ca ratio was found significantly lower in hypercalcuric children than in controls (p less than 0.001), but not between NSF and SF patients. Our data demonstrated that both NSF and SF groups had a significantly lower citrate/Ca ratio than controls (p less than 0.001), also it was lower in SF than in NSF (p less than 0.05). We found no significant difference in citrate excretion between boys and girls neither in patients nor in controls.