High water intake may decrease kidney stone risk

the Clinical Advisor take:

Patients who reported high water intake had significantly less risk of developing kidney stones, according to a meta-analysis presented at the National Kidney Foundation spring clinical meeting.

To investigate the impact of high water intake on kidney stone risk, Wisit Cheungpasitporn, MD, of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and colleagues culled data from two randomized trials and seven observational studies.

Patients who reported drinking a higher volume of water (at least 2.0 to 2.5 liters per day) were at a reduced risk for recurrent kidney stones, results from the randomized trials and observational studies indicated. The two trials had data from 268 patients and more than 250,000 patients from the observational studies, noted the researchers.

"This analysis shows that drinking water is an effective way to cut one's risk for developing kidney stones in half," said Kerry Willis, PhD, National Kidney Foundation (NKF) chief scientific officer, in an accompanying press release.

"Confirmation of reducing risk through improved hydration is an important finding."

Despite the results from these preliminary findings, Dhawan, DO, of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles — a scientist not associated with the study —  cautioned that high water intake may also lead to hyponatremia, altered mental states, confusion, and even seizures.

"Monitoring drinking water is just part of the problem — the other major problem is diet," said Dawan. "The notion that drinking water will completely prevent kidney stones, that's false. And we need other research to look at how kidney stones can be reduced."