The prevalence of renal stones among local residents in Saudi Arabia

BACKGROUND: Urolithiasis is the most common urological problem worldwide. It is a recurrent multifactorial problem that is caused by the interaction of several environmental and genetic factors. This study aimed to assess the prevalence of renal stones among local residents in Saudi Arabia in order to renew the statistics of renal stones occurrence in the current Saudi population. METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted using an electronic questionnairethat was distributed randomly through phones and social media to reach the local residents in Saudi Arabia. We then reviewed the published papers in Saudi journals for patients with renal stones. RESULTS: From a total of 580 responders to the electronic questionnaire, the prevalence of renal stones was 9.1% (n = 64). The median age at diagnosis was 29 years and the mean age at diagnosis was 36.91 years (SD = 18.66, Range of 20–99). Two peaks of age were observed, the first peak was at the (21–25) age group representing 34.4% of the kidney stones patients. The second peak was older than 47 years. The majority of those diagnosed with kidney stones had normal BMI (n = 29, 45.3%), and the family history of kidney stones among first degree relatives was found in 35.9% of the cases (n = 23). CONCLUSION: Kidney stones is a common health problem with the local incidence being underreported. In our sample, the prevalence was 9.1%. We also observed a relatively high percentage of positive family history among renal stone patients (34.9%) that could be attributed to the high rates of consanguinity. We encourage more local epidemiological studies to describe the patterns and the contributing factors of the development of kidney stones.