Question about having a Stent - Kidney Disorders Message Board

wideawakeinaz · 01-06-2004, 01:43 PM

I have a question that i never asked my doctor yet....

how can you sleep with the stent? can you sleep in normal positions or are you required to sleep in certain positions?

the kidney stone came out of my right kidney so will the stent be placed only in my right kidney or will it be placed from both kidneys?

i know the stent will have a string, my doctor did tell me that, so that is good. my doctor told me, pulling it out won't be that bad and it'll be done in his office.

but i was just wondering about this stent questions....never really thought about them till now.

farscape66 · 01-06-2004, 04:33 PM

I know this much, according to my doc. 80 % of people take stents very well and dont even know they have them, 205 find them very annoying and need pain meds and other meds to stop frequent urination urge caused by the stent.

I understand that removal is not that bad, but minutes after removal there is considerable pain for a couple of hours that fades away.

I am told you can sleep in any position. It is only put in the kidney that had the stone, only on one side.

I have my operation friday morning and will soon have first hand experience.
When is your op? Keep us posted?

serialnovelist · 01-06-2004, 08:31 PM

I've had my stent in since the 22nd of december and i get it out the 7th. I can do just about anything with it, except have sex. Ths stent only goes from the kidney to the outside of the ureteral opening that empties into the bladder. Mine is called a Double J so it hooks in the kidney and then hooks into the bladder.

There are two strings attached to it and while wierd it's not that bad. the only thing i hateis sometimes when your urinating the urine backs up into the kidney, like backwash from a straw and the urine hitting the kidney does hurt, but it doesn't happens all the time.

I talked to an M.D. who said if you have a stent that has a string coming out it is NOT painful, it just feels a little "odd" while it's coming out. The stents that are painful are the ones where they have to do a mini cystoscopy and use a scope to go in and get the stent. I assume all the horror stories are from those experiences, since that mainly happens while your asleep when they do the surgery to put the stent in place.

Don't go running marathons, or dancing, or be overly active with a stent, just rest until it's removed and then rest some more for a few days after and everything should be fine.

farscape66 · 01-07-2004, 12:05 PM

The whole concept is horrifying to me, why cant they just make disolving stents, like they mak disolving stitches. This seems so primitive and barbaric.

serialnovelist · 01-07-2004, 04:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by farscape66

The whole concept is horrifying to me, why cant they just make disolving stents, like they mak disolving stitches. This seems so primitive and barbaric.

because the whole point of having the stent is to have something HARD that keeps the ureter OPEN more than it normally is so you can easily and painlessly pass any fragments left over from surgery. I passed quite a large fragment from my surgery and it was painless because of the stent. you don't want fragments and jagged edges of stones scraping against the ureter and causing bleeding and scarring.

BE SURE to get a stent with a nice long string attached and it's no big deal. Having the stent is FAR worse than the removal, but i'm still glad i had the stent and after the x ray the urologist just had taken i can now say i am 100% STONE FREE !!!!

I wish everyone especially you Farscape the best of luck and that everything goes smooth, painless and you end up stone free too. if your really nervous about having your stent removed take a XANAX before you go in. Might help big time.