The Kidney Stone Diet

I have kidney stones (renal calculi or nephroliths) so this post is more for me than anyone else.

Ima finally gonna to write this stuff down and post it to my fridge.

First, I am not a medical professional, this post is for infotainment purposes only. Consult with a qualified health care provider before making any medical related decisions or embarking on any diet or health activity.

Second, this list is tuned mostly for calcium oxalate stones. Other types of stones may require a different food balance.

Now, on to the post. Here are the dietary tips.

Drink More Fluids

The most important thing you can do for preventing kidney stones is to drink more fluids. If you can, try to drink 8 to 10 glasses of water a day.

You know that you are drinking enough water if your urine is clear or a light yellow colour. If your urine is dark yellow, then that is a sign that you are not drinking enough fluids.

Eat Less Salty Food

If you have a calcium kidney stone, it may help to eat less salt and eat less salty foods.

A good way to achieve this is to avoid most processed foods, fast foods and to limit how often you eat at restaurants or food courts. These companies add salt to make the dishes more savoury and to keep you coming back. Tasty but bad for you.

Salt is also in many condiments, seasonings, and meats so read the labels and limit these sources.

Avoid Foods With Oxalates

If you had a calcium-oxalate kidney stone, or for short, an oxalate stone, you will want to limit foods that contain a lot of oxalate, such as dark green vegetables, nuts, and chocolate (this kinda sucks, not the vegetables but the chocolate).

You don't have to totally give up these foods, just eat or drink less of them.

Limit Animal Protein

Make sure that you eat a balanced diet which is not that high in animal protein as protein may lead to kidney stones. .

The food sources typically are: beef, chicken, pork, fish, and eggs.

It is not likely that you need to eliminate these foods just make sure that its not the main source of your calories.

Increase Your Fiber Intake

One of the secondary sources I reviewed recommends that you increase the fiber you eat and then it goes on to identify oat bran, beans, whole wheat breads, wheat cereals, cabbage, and carrots.

Some of those in the list are also high in oxalate so that is a bit of a contradiction. It looks like care needs to be taken when choosing your fiber source.

The Big List of Things To Avoid

• Tea (high in oxalate)
• Spinach (high in oxalate)
• Raspberries (high in oxalate)
• Rhubarb (high in oxalate)
• Potatoes (high in oxalate)
• Potato chips (high in oxalate and salt)
• Sweet potatoes (high in oxalate)
• Rice bran (high in oxalate)
• Almonds and other nuts (high in oxalate)
• Miso soup (high in oxalate)
• Soy flour (high in oxalate)
• Soy milk (high in oxalate)
• Navy beans (high in oxalate)
• Grapefruit juice (high in oxalate)
• Hot chocolate (high in oxalate)
• High sugar loads (this will increase your urine calcium load).

Also you should talk to a health care professional about vitamins and supplements if you take them. They may recommend that you to limit fish liver oil, calcium supplements and vitamin C.

Increase These Foods

Lemonade

Make sure that you consume lemonade that is made from real lemons and is not just lemon flavoring with water and sugar.

Lemons are high in citrate, the thinking is that this may alter the pH in your kidneys and help prevent kidney stones.

Food-based Calcium

Do your best to get calcium from food instead of supplements if you can.

Milk, cheese, and yogurt are all good dietary sources of calcium.

It is counter-intuitive that consuming calcium can help with calcium oxalate stones but the latest advice says that it is not.

If you have the right amount of calcium it can absorb oxalate in the intestines and before it gets to your blood stream and then kidneys.

The advice seems to be: don't cut back on your calcium intake. Instead reduce the sodium in your diet and pair calcium-rich foods with oxalate-rich foods.

In Summary

The kidney stone diet can basically be summed up as: high fluid, high calcium, low sodium, low refined sugar, normal protein, and oxalate management.

When you have passed stone and the pain is a distant memory you will tend to forget about the dietary discipline.

Do your best to remember the pain and keep up your new food habits.

Post Sources

Primary Source

J.S. Rodman M.D. (2007) No More Kidney Stones, Revised Edition, Hoboken New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, ISBN 978-0-471-73929-6 (paperback).

Secondary Sources

1. https://kidneystones.uchicago.edu/how-to-eat-a-low-oxalate-diet/
2. https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/urologic-diseases/kidney-stones/definition-facts
3. http://www.upmc.com/patients-visitors/education/nutrition/Pages/low-oxalate-diet.aspx
4. https://www.curejoy.com/content/foods-to-avoid-if-you-have-kidney-stones/