Kidney Cancer Information

I remember very well when my urologist told me that he will have to place a ureteral stent, commonly referred to as kidney stent, in my ureter. I was just diagnosed with kidney cancer a few weeks earlier. The blood in my urine and the dull pain I had experienced for a while turned out to be the result of a 7 cm tumor that was in the process of eating my left kidney.

I had had no idea what I was in for when I just nodded my head to my urologist’s announcement. Kidney stent – to me that sounded like a little tube, maybe a couple inches long at the most and certainly ultra-thin. Well, it turned out that my image of kidney stents was slightly off. I will tell you more in a little bit about how I dealt with that alien object inside my body before it was finally taken out again.

What is a kidney stent good for?

A kidney stent is inserted into the ureter, which is the ‘connection’ between the kidney and the bladder. Both ends of the stent are coiled in order to prevent it from moving around. Those stents are designed flexible enough so they adjusted to movements of the body. Kidney stents are anywhere between 24 to 30 centimetres long.

Before for we continue to discuss in more detail the purpose of those ureteral stents, we first need to make sure that we’re on the same page and have a good understanding of how the urinary system works in general.

All the way up top are the two kidneys. They are connected via the ureters to the bladder. The blood is being filtered in the kidneys and all the toxic waste is being flushed through the ureters down to the bladder. When the bladder is full you feel the urge to urinate. The urine is then being discharged through the urethra.

Here is a picture of the urinary tract:



Here is the problem: the ureters can become obstructed for a variety of reasons. Thus, the urine cannot be excreted which means the body cannot get rid of all the toxins that are usually being discharged when we go to the bathroom. 
Okay, that obviously brings us to the next question. What are the causes that can lead to the obstruction of the ureters?

So what we just discussed under point 4) is what happened to me. After my CAT-Scan which revealed my malignant mass in my left kidney, my urologist ordered a cystoscopy, also called an ureteroscopy. In unsophisticated terms, a small tube with a camera is being inserted through the genitals up the urethra to inspect the urinary tract and find out whether or not there is any sing of cancer that has spread outside the kidney.

Of course, just the thought of having a 30 cm stent inserted into your ureter can cause some real pain. Well, imagine the actual pain of this procedure. I was so happy when I was told that I will be put under general anaesthesia.
When I woke up after the cystoscopy I had to pee very urgently. I spare you the gory details, because gory it was indeed. Thank God I still had enough pain killers in system – however, by the time we got home, they had worn off. The pain during urinating was excruciating, it was unbelievable. But after a few days it got better, I guess I simply got used to my kidney stent.

The Kidney Stent Removal

About four weeks later I was scheduled for my nephrectomy, the surgical removal of my left kidney. I remember that I re-confirmed with my surgeons that they will not forget to remove my kidney stent. By then I really had enough of that thing. The head surgeon laughed and assured me that he will take it out.

Of course having a kidney removed is no fun. However, I was really happy that the stent was finally gone. At least I felt absolutely no more pain when I had to urinate.

I found a pretty cool animated video animation of a utereal stent insertion procedure: