Do dietary factors play a role in infantile urolithiasis?

Urolithiasis is a significant cause of morbidity that may be diagnosed at a young age. However, there is little research on the role of nutrition in pediatric urolithiasis, and research on the infantile period is extremely rare. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of dietary factors on those diagnosed with "idiopathic" infantile urolithiasis.

The study group included 44 infants without a proven etiological factor for urolithiasis. The control group consisted of 60 fully healthy infants of matched age and gender. The parents and caregivers of each infant in the patient and control groups were carefully questioned by the same researcher for their dietary characteristics.

The duration of formula usage and daily volume of formula were statistically higher in the study group than the control group (p = 0.041 and p = 0.003, respectively). The urolithiasis group consumed significantly more cow's milk and dairy products (p = 0.033 and p = 0.001). There was no statistically meaningful difference between the two groups in terms of starting age for free water and salty food, as well as daily water intake.

We concluded that dietary conditions could also be a risk factor for idiopathic urolithiasis. We believe that nutritional factors for infantile urolithiasis should be better described, in addition to genetic, anatomical, and metabolic factors. A higher resolution version of the Graphical abstract is available as Supplementary information.