Evaluation of gross and microscopic hematuria

In summary, hematuria, either gross or microscopic and with or without any accompanying symptoms, should always alert the clinician to the possibility of serious urologic disease and should virtually always trigger a thorough urologic investigation. This can be done by immediate referral to the urologist, or it can be done by the primary care physician initiating the diagnostic work-up in children by obtaining studies for acute poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis and in adults by obtaining excretory urograms with physiologic voiding films and also by urine cytologic studies and urine cultures. Appropriate referral to a urologist can then be made for additional studies that might be indicated, such as cystoscopy and cystourethroscopy and for meticulous follow-up of any abnormal findings. The physician who delays or defers a careful investigation into the cause of a given patient's hematuria (gross or microscopic) does the patient a disservice at best and, at worst, may inadvertently permit a significant disease process to become more extensive.