Incomplete Distal Renal Tubular Acidosis and Kidney Stones

Publication date: July 2018Source: Advances in Chronic Kidney Disease, Volume 25, Issue 4Author(s): Daniel G. Fuster, Orson W. MoeRenal tubular acidosis (RTA) is comprised of a diverse group of congenital or acquired diseases with the common denominator of defective renal acid excretion with protean manifestation, but in adults, recurrent kidney stones and nephrocalcinosis are mainly found in presentation. Calcium phosphate (CaP) stones and nephrocalcinosis are frequently encountered in distal hypokalemic RTA type I. Alkaline urinary pH, hypocitraturia, and, less frequently, hypercalciuria are the tripartite lithogenic factors in distal RTA (dRTA) predisposing to CaP stone formation; the latter 2 are also commonly encountered in other causes of urolithiasis. Although the full blown syndrome is easily diagnosed by conventional clinical criteria, an attenuated forme fruste called incomplete dRTA typically evades clinical testing and is only uncovered by provocative acid-loading challenges. Stone formers (SFs) that cannot acidify urine of pH < 5.3 during acid loading are considered to have incomplete dRTA. However, urinary acidification capacity is not a dichotomous but rather a continuous trait, so incomplete dRTA is not a distinct entity but may be one end of a spectrum. Recent findings suggest that incomplete dRTA can be attributed to heterozygous carriers of hypofunctional V-ATPase. The value of incomplete dRTA diagnosis by provocative testing and genotyping candidate ...
Source: Advances in Chronic Kidney Disease - Category: Urology & Nephrology Source Type: research