Hello gang, it seems my left kidney is not draining properly into my bladder, right one is fine
doctor is suggesting we put in a "ureteral stent" right now I have a continuous low level dull pain in my left groin area ct scan shows some inflammation of the ureteral tube that connects the kidney to the bladder, anyone here have experience or have been in this situation before? first we are going to wait thirty days and see what it does on its own, and there is another type of scan we are going to do that shows how the kidney is draining
I know there can be complications and more blood in the urine resulting from this procedure. comments and suggestions please. I had robotic surgery my psa is 14 and I am on ADT and Chemo right now, just finished my #16 of chemo.
thank you and hold on tight it may be a bumpy ride.
jack
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MrJack
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I had 18 urinary stents implanted and removed from a period of 1/14/2008 to 11/30/2012. They were performed in the doctor's office (no hospital and no anesthesia). A piece of cake, no pain and a no discomfort. In fact one time it was enjoyable (hey get it any way you can). My urologist at the time was Dr. R. Ernest Sosa who is now a consultant MD at the V.A. in NYC. Make sure the doc prescribes CIPRO to avoid infection.
I know going up the ole wiener sounds horrifying but it's not.
Well jack my situation is that my left urinary tract is scarred by passing stones or from radiation (no definite answer by docs) and my left kidney is 1/3 functioning. So to make a long story longer I no longer need a stent. My reason for responding to your inquiry is to assure you that the insertion and removal of a urinary stent up the willie is nuttin.....
I had stents and the entire time they were colonized with ravaging u t i’s. Cipro destroys the joints. I did so many anti-biotics while I had stents and or tubes for a yr and1/2 that I became immune to all except Bactrim .It had Killer side effects from that one. Rt and adt shrank tumors allowing all tubes and finally stents off. That was a glorious day that I hope you’ll see sooner than later. A lot of prayers to get us thru these nightmarish scenarios we find oreselves forced into in order to survive. Hang in there big daddy! Its hell, I know , we pray you get the stunts out and off of antibiotics too .They drag our immunity then the mud. Save our lifes but can take a toll .
@Mr jack. My advice is have the uteral Stent put in. I had mine a year ago and it was and is painless still. It's a simple procedure and is replaced every 4 months. Good luck.
Jack, I had the same issue. Had the stent put in back in March. It's a simple procedure, but they do knock you out for it. I had mine done in the morning, then drove to Florida later that day, so it's no big thing. The only drawback is now I pee more frequently.
Hi Jack, Yes I had and have that same situation. I had yo habe an external nephoscopy tube for 3 months until they were ableto instal an internal stent..i am on my 4th stent ..the body seems to rekect them ..the latest one i had onstalled is a flexible stainless steel one that shoild last up to 1 year ...4 months in and I seem to be having the same issues..i had RP in 2011 salvage radiation in 2012...been on lupron for 2 years ..bumpy ride ...that ain't the half of it ..good luck ..
Boy, you’ve been through hell. I myself had neauphostmy tubes and or stints for over a yr and 1/2.. pc tumors blocked urethra. ADT plus RT shrank everything happily then tubes &stints no more. I know exactly how you feel and what you are going thru..It is brutal. It seems like that was 100 yrs ago now 11/2 yrs later..I was never comfortable the entire time..U T I infections and massive anti biopics the whole time..Hope you fare better than I did with no UTI’s for you.. I’m praying for you to get out of that hell to a better place..
I can relate I had the tubes foley and or stints for my fist 11/2 brush with APC. I’m out of that mess gor now. TG, I pray for anyone in that position to be able to get out. Hard to explain to others how these procedures take president ovet all when you need them . They didn’t do these things even 50 yrs ago my uro told me. We all would have been dead already from kidney failure. We r all here on borrowed time sir. Take care.
Generally, it is recommended that stents be removed or exchanged before every 3-4 months. But what happens if you have it in place longer than this or if your stent is forgotten?
Abdominal xray of a patient with a forgotten stent that had been in place for three years.
One of the most common things that may happen to ureteral stents is encrustation, in which calcifications form around the placed stent. This phenomenon occurs to a minor degree in many patients and is usually of little consequence. It is most extensive when the stent is left in place for too long, and urinary tract obstruction and infection may occur as a result of encrustation. The amount of stent encrustation is directly related to how long a ureteral stent has remained in place. One study found that 9.2% of stents became encrusted when in place for less than 6 weeks, while 47.5% of stents that remained in place for 6 to 12 weeks were encrusted and 76.3% of stents were encrusted after 12 weeks (El-Faqih et al, 1991). The length of time a stent remains in place is in fact the greatest risk factor for stent encrustation.
They are prone to infection. That’s the problem.. My stents where colonized continuously with rampant infection.. That’s suffering to a high degree..
II am not a Doctor, Jack, but anytime you have discomfort or pain during chemo treatment, you should discuss this with your Medical Oncologist. My guy specializes in kidney and prostate cancers. It was never an issue. However, when I first had PCa primary treatment, my Oncological Registered Nurse told me, if you ever have trouble peeing go take a sitz bath (sitting in hot water for 15-20 minutes - I did that 2-3 times a day) to relax your muscles. The alternative is a catheter or stent to drain the kidneys and you don't want the kidneys to not drain.
Even today, after receiving that advice fourteen years later, whenever I have trouble peeing, I go sit in my tub with hot water and pee away. I also take Flomax twice aday and have done so ever since I had primary treatment.
Consider this, all primary treatments for PCa cause trauma on the urinary system. As a result, I tend to believe that difficulty in urinating is not chemo induced, but rather the trauma for primary PCa procedures. I wish you well.
Good luck with procedure. The goal will be to get them out Asp..Good luck kicking that damm pain..
Hi Jack,
I'm curious to know what would cause a ureter to block, or does it collapse. In my case, the urethra was blocked, which caused one hell of a backup. Did your Uro explain why? I'd sure like to know. Hope all goes well.
my uro was so backed up himself with patients he did not have time for all my questions, I am upset at that, all I gathered is it is mild blockage at this point we are going to do an additional scan this month and monitor the situation, while I sit here and wonder if I am damaging my kidney, I don't want to damage my kidney ;-(
Jack, that's an issue, in and of itself. Is your Uro doing what's in your best interest? My first one did, or so I thought. He was great, until I found out he was a complete idiot. I had a blocked urethra for almost three years, and he kept feeding me incontinence meds. Now that I have all my medical records, I can see that he either couldn't read, or just didn't give a shit. It's all there in black and white, many times over. He's no longer in practice, who do you sue?
ok thanks Joe, I was wondering how much time I have to "do something" you tell me you were in pain for three years, wow, you deserve a medal.
I'm gonna give it 30 days and see if it improves, do these things improve on there own? I don't know, I have emailed my Urologist we will see what he says, my impression of him is that he is very smart and skilled just overloaded with work.
You have my same Uro. No time for many questions..In fact he got mad at me for asking questions...Who cares? Primarily a surgeon .. Not a lot of time on the other stuffI. I am grateful to him for saving my life with all of the surgeries. But what an ego....
I had kidney stents in for a bit over 8 months. My PCa was diagnosed because there was a PCa tumor in my bladder which caused a urinary blockage from my right kidney to the bladder. The urologist initially put kidney stents on both my right and left sides. The one on the left side came out after 2.5 months, but I had stents in the right side for 8 months and one week. The kidney stents had to be replaced at approximately 3 month intervals so I had three different stents in my left ureter over the 8 months. In my case there was no option, at least on the right side. My right kidney was swelling, painful and starting to fail due to the urinary blockage.
The stents were irritating but not horrible. They scratched and poked me internally and occasionally would cause a little bit of blood in my urine. The initial one inserted was larger than it needed to be; each time they put a new one in it was slightly smaller and this reduced the side effects.
The main impact of the stents was that it substantially limited my physical activity. If I tried to be too physically active, it caused more scratching, poking and blood in my urine. I had been an avid bicycle rider and had to nearly stop while the stents were in and also had to limit things like yard work.
The stents were inserted right at the time of diagnosis, which was over 5 years ago. I started Androgen Deprivation Therapy (ADT) immediately and had external beam radiation a few months later The combination eventually reduced the size of the tumor in my bladder enough that the stent was no longer needed. The good news is that the stents have been out for over 4 years now and I have been off the ADT meds for almost 3 years now and the bladder tumor seems to be staying in remission thus far.
Great news a great story and a lot of suffering ..I’m glad you made it..All of this stuff is unbelievable unless you ve been thru it yourself..continued good health to you..
I just had a "Renal scan" done and am waiting for the results, I continue to have some blood in my urine but the amount has gone down , and the pain has gone down, I will continue to wait and watch, I feel ok today.
I had them exact same problem in Sept of this year. My left kidney was hurting and when it became unbearable I went to the emergency room. After blood test and explaining my symptoms I took a CAT scan which showed that my left kidney was not draining the urine through the ureter. I was taken to emergency surgery where they inserted a stent and they drained the left kidney because of the urine accumulated. I took antibiotics for the next 10 days and I have the stent removed after 1 week. Conclusion was that it was caused by prostatitis and they don't know for sure what causes prostatitis if it's a bacteria or something else I'm doing fine now and I hope that this never happens to me again I hope you recover from your own situation.
Best of luck for you Jack! I don't know if you had the answers you're looking for yet! I can tell you from my personal experience with stents, I've had 14 total and 9 of those were bilateral. They were agonizing for me, some people have no problems with them. And some people's bodies want to reject them, after all it's foreign material in our bodies. I just want to say that not everyones experience is pleasant! Mine were very painful and I passed raspberry colored urine daily, the only relief I got was when they were removed. 5 weeks was my longest time with one and it came out early because it was agony and I begged my urologist to take it out! My condition however isn't prostate cancer, but I'm at high risk for cancer because of genetics.
Anyways my grandfather has crpc and he is on lupron and oral chemo. He just had his Stent replaced on the 6th of this month(every 3 months) . I was able to ask why he needed the stents being it's only prostate cancer! The uro oncologist was also busy and didn't have much time to go into details but he gave me the short answer. Because his prostate cancer matastesized(sp) to his lymph nodes, the lymph nodes are pressing on and closing up his ureter, so therefore he can't pass urine which will cause hydronephrosis and cause him to go into renal failure because of toxins and etc. I myself experience this but due to chronic kidney stone blockage and scar tissue,that is why I get stents. Anyways that's the short answer for you! My pap and also both take Flomax and a high blood pressure medicine to help the kidneys from needing to function so hard. I take chlorthalidone which not only helps the kidneys from over working but it also helps breakdown oxalate/salt so there are less toxins. I'm 36 years old and trying to limit my future problems, unfortunately my prostate is already enlarged and with my kidney problems I'm a little scared and maybe paranoid. My pap and his surviving brother both have prostate cancer and they lost their older brother from it. So I think my fear is justifiable!
But I wish you the best of luck on your health care journey and hope I was able to answer anything you may not know. Happy Holidays and stay strong!
thank you, thanks for replying, this site and sites like this are wonderful
and people like you, I will look into some pill or medicine or routine that I can do first ahead of taking the dreaded "stent" so again thank you so much for being here.
Mrjack ,although unwanted , that stint is just another step towards saving your life.. Just pray for the day that you won’t need it anymore.. That’s the goal ...ask for propathal, .I remember that golden day when they removed my final stints 11/2 yrs ago . I was pre op with wife and nurse, the guy came in and said “ I’m going to give you something to relax you a little bit” I said to the nurse and wife “Im ready to go” their retort “ you already did it” .Couldnt believe it . No nausea or ill effects afterward.. not a hint on memory of surgery..Best and last trip to catch lab. Of which I was on a first name basis with them after so many tune ups.. Good luck...
36 what the F***? I’d bet that’s what you’re saying .. I’m sorry you got this so freakin young .. I was told I was young at 53.You know you got this. Take care young man and you will prevail..
Mrjack , you are in the heat of battle right now. I pray for you to come out of this to the other side.Then you can smell the roses again .I believe most of us suffer emotionally and experience ranges of powerful emotions fuled by lack of T.
You are not alone in these. Many take a variety of meds for this. I use canaby. Doesn’t take all of the edge off but I have much more fun
And enjoyment with it. Without it the docs wanted to put me on calonipine and lexipro then after a month the shrink was to talk to me. I got out of that depression with taking that route. Each to their own Hope you get solutions soon.
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