Therapeutische Umschau. Revue thérapeutique
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Annual incidences of kidney stones are about 0.1-0.4% of the population, and lifetime prevalences in the USA and Europe range between 8 and 15%. Kidney stones occur more frequently with increasing age and among men. Within ten years, the disease usually recurs in more than 50% of patients. ⋯ On the other hand, a diet rich in alkali (vegetables, fruit) is associated with a lower risk of stone formation. A "common sense diet" containing sufficient amounts of fluids, 1200 mg of calcium per day and reduced amounts of flesh protein as well as salt is able to reduce the 5-year stone recurrence rate in calcium stone formers by 50%. The scientific evidence for drug treatment (thiazides, alkali citrate) is rather poor: the most widely quoted randomized thiazide trial included only 42 patients of whom 36% left the protocol prematurely, whereas 36-48% of patients included in three randomized studies with alkali citrate suffered from undesirable side-effects; nevertheless, citrate therapy reduced the stone recurrence rate by 38%, compared with 22% in patients on placebo treatment (p < 0.0005).