Nephrocalcinosis: another preemie issue :/
Ugh. I'm really sorry to do another drive by post. Life feels totally nuts & overwhelming right now.
The good news is Elliott is way happier and doing very well...
but the bad news is Andrew got a giant ass (size of popcorn kernal) kidney stone on Friday night. I saw it and ran to urgent care...his pedi had not heard of this in toddlers....
We are waiting for lab rresults of the stone. He got a renal u/s today - showing several more small ones. Preliminary answer from a nephrologist is that she is pretty sure he has nephrocalcinosis - too much calcium retained in kidney forming stones. She said about half of the early preemies have this. I Googled "nephrocalcinosis" and in almost all of the websites it says "common in preemies".
We are still doing more blood work, urine sample, etc to rule things out. Then we see the specialist. I don't know if they will do some kind of medicine or just a strict diet of low salt and citrus to try to keep stones from forming.
Poor preemies, just can't ever have it easy...
Re: Nephrocalcinosis: another preemie issue :/
Poor Andrew! And poor you-I know this is very stressful and you already have your hands full. I hope the tests come back with lots of answers and you can find an easy way to help him through this.
Keep us posted.
Our precious girl, born at 27 weeks.
This is interesting. Andrew was on diuretcs for his lungs, too (maybe most preemies are I don't know). Do you think it's possible the stones formed in the NICU and he just happened to have one grow & pass it? I should read his NICU release info although I doubt it mentions anything.
They said the others are very small and have probably been there a long time. I haven't met with the specialist yet so I really have minimal information at this point.
Lilith has Nephrocalcinosis as well. Her Nephrologist said it is very common in preemies. Their bodies have a hard time processing the excess calcium from the IV's they had, then you add a diuretic like Lasix on top of it, and their Kidneys get overloaded with calcium. I wouldn't be surprised if Andrew's Kidney stones developed in the NICU. We wouldn't even had known Lily had Nephrocalcinosis, except the Doctors ordered an ultrasound to check for a different problem.
Right now, Lilith is just taking 1ML of Diurill, twice a day. That seems to be helping the problem. Her Nephrologist said that most cases of Nephrocalcinosis clear up within a year or two with medication, and when it's gone, it's gone. We go back for a check up every six months to do a repeat ultrasound and up her medication as needed. Hopefully Andrew's case can be managed by medication as well.