Dietary taboos for stones

First identify the type of stones you have and then target specific food taboos. You must avoid excessive long-term intake of high-oxalate, high-purine, high-sodium and high-sugar foods. The worst mistake you should make is to deliberately control water and use so-called "stone removal remedies" to replace normal dietary adjustments.

Last week I accompanied my aunt for a follow-up urology check-up. In the clinic, I met a young man in his early twenties, who was sweating in pain and had just finished lithotripsy. He said that he had checked the stones online and found that he could not eat tofu. In the past three months, he had not even dared to touch soy milk, but he still developed new stones. The director laughed at that time and said that his taboo was completely in the wrong direction - the young man had calcium oxalate stones and usually ate takeout. He also loved eating chicken feet with pickled peppers and drinking iced black tea. Instead of tabooing these high-sodium and high-sugar foods, he was unfairly treated with tofu.

Speaking of which, there are too many misunderstandings about stone taboos, and even academic opinions are constantly being updated. As for calcium supplementation, ten years ago many guidelines recommended that stone patients reduce their intake of high-calcium foods. This has long been overturned: Calcium in a normal diet (such as a box of pure milk and about 100 grams of brine tofu per day) will combine with oxalic acid in the intestines in advance to form an unabsorbed precipitate. What you really want to avoid is taking large doses of calcium supplements when there is nothing wrong. If the extra calcium exceeds the body's needs, it will be released into the urine, increase the urinary calcium concentration, and promote the formation of stones.

I used to know an old patient with calcium oxalate stones. He used to take imported calcium tablets every day to prevent osteoporosis, and he also ate stir-fried spinach. During a six-month review, the stones grew 3 mm. Later, he stopped the calcium tablets according to the doctor's instructions. He blanched the spinach for 1 minute each time before frying. Now, almost two years later, the stones have not only not grown, but have also become smaller. To be honest, spinach is really not a scourge. Just blanch it for 1 minute to remove more than 70% of the oxalic acid. There is no need to blacken it directly. On the contrary, those spinach, water spinach, amaranth, strong tea, unprocessed nuts, rhubarb and other foods that are not blanched are risky only if they are eaten in large amounts for a long time.

Oh, by the way, if you have uric acid stones, the focus of taboos is completely different. The elder brother I met in the clinic before was diagnosed with stones. He had crayfish and cold beer with friends every night. He suffered from gout twice but didn't take it seriously. He was so painful that he rolled around and came to the hospital. Only then did he find out that it was uric acid stones. Instead, he doesn't need to worry about whether to blanch the spinach or not. What he has to control is the urge to eat high-purine foods such as fried belly, drunken crab, thick bone broth, and sardines. He also needs to drink more soda to alkalize his urine, which is better than anything else.

Many people tend to ignore the problem of high sodium. If you usually eat takeout, pickled vegetables, processed meat products, or even stir-fry at home, you put too much salt in it. Excessive sodium intake will directly increase the excretion of calcium in the urine, which is equivalent to the concentration of calcium in the urine rising out of thin air. Isn’t it easy to form stones? My young patient later gave up taking out food and used less salt when cooking at home. He even cut out the soy sauce duck and pickled radish that he used to love. No new small stones appeared during this review.

There is another very common mistake. Many people think that drinking sweet drinks can also be considered as hydration. This is really wrong. The fructose in sweet drinks not only increases uric acid, but also promotes urinary calcium excretion, which is simply a breeding ground for stones. I have seen several teenage children get stones because they do not drink boiled water at all and drink Coke and iced tea as water every day. It is really not worth the loss. As for what everyone is asking about, can I have tea? Light tea is absolutely fine. Our department director makes light green tea and drinks it every day. We are afraid of strong tea that will become bitter when brewed, and old tea that has been stored for several days. The oxalic acid content can increase several times. If you really like strong tea, you should either change it to a lighter one, or don’t eat it with high oxalic acid dishes.

After all, there are really not so many sensational restrictions on dietary taboos for stones. Don't scare yourself into eating anything, and don't take it seriously. If you are really not sure what you should avoid, going to the hospital for a stone composition analysis, which costs a few dozen yuan, is much more useful than searching for a hundred various taboos on the Internet. Drink more boiled water at ordinary times, and drink enough 2L every day, which is more reliable than any expensive stone-clearing health products.