# Why you need a 24-hour urine collection Source: https://kidneystonediet.com/ep/why-you-need-a-24-hour-urine-collection/ Published: 2020-11-03 --- [![Kidney Stone Diet Podcast](https://kidneystonediet.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Kidney-Stone-Diet-Podcast-1-1024x1024.jpg)](https://kidneystonediet.com/podcast/) [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaKYY6IJ8co)[Apple Podcasts](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/why-you-need-a-24-hour-urine-collection/id1528474326?i=1000497080214&uo=4)[Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/episode/6lOHyTXHDy0UayUKBXiwF2)[Amazon Music](https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/0868148d-adfd-411d-b3f2-71a0ad1461ec) November 3, 2020 --- ![Jeff Sarris](https://kidneystonediet.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Jeff-Sarris-150x150.jpg) Jeff Sarris Host ![Jill Harris](https://kidneystonediet.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/Kidney-Stone-Diet-Jill-Harris-150x150.jpg) Jill Harris Host In this episode of the Kidney Stone Diet Podcast Jill explains why a [24-Hour Urine Collection](https://kidneystonediet.com/24-hour-urine-analysis/) is an important first step in treating your kidney stone disease.\ \ • [24-Hour Urinalysis Consult](https://kidneystonediet.com/24-hour-urine-analysis/) – a 15 minute private phone consultation with Jill to explain what your values mean and the important points to discuss during your next doctor visit.\ \ • [Kidney Stone Diet](https://kidneystonediet.com/)\ • [Kidney Stone Prevention Program](https://kidneystonediet.com/kidney-stone-prevention)\ • [Oxalate Food List](https://kidneystonediet.com/oxalate-list/)\ \ Find the full transcript at [BYLT.co/show/kidney-stone-diet](https://bylt.co/show/kidney-stone-diet) ## Chapters - 00:00:14 Importance of 24-Hour Urine Collections - 00:03:36 Why Doctors Skip Ordering Urine Collections - 00:07:54 Interpreting 24-Hour Urine Test Results - 00:11:31 Free Educational Resources for Stone Prevention ## Transcript ### Importance of 24-Hour Urine Collections 00:00:14 Jeff Sarris Welcome back to the Kidney Stone Diet podcast, the show about reducing your risk for kidney stones and living your best life. I'm your host and fellow student, Jeff Sarris, and I am here as always with our resident kidney stone prevention expert, Jill Harris. Hello, Jill! 00:00:27 Jill Harris Nurses in the house, how you doing? Good to see ya. 00:00:30 Jeff Sarris Doing well. Yeah, we have another week in the books here, about to start this week's episode, and we have the 24-hour urine collection. So, that's a big part of the platform, or big part of what people have to sort of start their journey with. So, let's just Start with the basics. What is a 24-hour urine collection and why is it important? 00:00:54 Jill Harris I always get very excited because Jeff doesn't tell me what we're really going to talk about until we do it. So, it keeps it fresh for me. So, 24-hour urine collections, let's see. Let's see how much I can scream about those, a lot. I do it every day, I do it on my Facebook group, I do it with my patients. Here's why they are important. They are important because you need to see what are some of the factors that are leading you to form kidney stones. Lots so much of this is diet. You also, though, want to rule out any other genetic issues that could be going on with you. So, here's here's what I deal with on a daily basis. Say on my Facebook group. " Jill, my doctor didn't order a 24-hour urine collection. He or she said, 'Just drink some lemon juice and stay away from spinach or all green leafy vegetables.' They threw a list at me." Okay, so this is very, very common. So, what I always push back and say is this, "What, you know…" And then And then, I'm going to jump ahead, then they sign up with me, they work with me privately, and they're like, "Look, I did what the doctor told me. I drank lemon juice. I gave away the green leafy vegetables. I haven't had a vegetable now in 4 years, and I just did my first 24-hour urine collection, And I see that my urine calcium is super high." So, meaning, and they got new stones now, okay? So, they heard me ranting, they did get a 24-hour urine collection order for themselves. The doctor said, "You don't need it." The patient's like, "I want it." They get it, and then they see. Look, they didn't need to do the things that they were doing. So, they did what the doctor said, but those weren't the problems to begin with, and now they made new stones. And by the way, all the tooth enamel on their teeth are gone because they've been sucking on lemons 24 hours a day, and they didn't need to do that. So, it shouldn't be a generic treatment plan. The 24-hour urine collection Will tell the doctor or the nurse practitioner what or the physician assistant what is going on, what is leading you to an increased risk of stones, and based upon those results, then you get a treatment plan, okay? That's how it goes. It's like putting me on more chemo without doing blood tests to see if my cancer's back, or, I mean, that may not be the best example, ### Why Doctors Skip Ordering Urine Collections 00:03:36 Jill Harris But we can't offer treatment plans to patients unless we know why something is going what is going on with the patient. Meaning, you could be prescribing the wrong treatment plan. Why don't doctors order 24-hour urine collections? I get this a lot, too. Doctors will tell me, "Listen, Jill. It's wonderful that your patients stop forming stones, But my patients, they don't want to change their diet. So, I stopped long ago ordering 24-hour urine collections because there was no point in wasting their time or my time in going over them when they weren't about to change their diet." Now, to defend doctors, and I don't always, I will certainly speak, you know, give my opinion. But doctors are very right. I should have been able to retire 10 years ago. I've been doing this for decades. I have not been able to retire because people don't want to change their diet. I hear all the time, "Oh, Jill, I'll take a chance. I'll get another stone." People that want to work with me and throw money at me, meaning pay for my services, Are very dedicated and they are They never want to go through that pain again, and so they take a chance on me. They're like, " let me see what this broad is talking about. I'll throw some money at her. We'll see." My patients stop making stones. They stop making stones. I am successful. My career is extremely successful Because my patients work their tush-a-loosh off. If they did not, I would not be successful. So, my success is extremely well dependent on all the stuff Dr. Co taught me and the fact that my patients work so hard. But they wouldn't know what to work on if they didn't do a 24-hour urine collection. It is imperative. If your doctor says you don't need it, you say, "Yes, I do." And then you tell the doctor, "Let me tell you why I want to do one, because I am highly interested in never making another stone again, and I will do whatever it takes, Dr. Do-Little, to get that done. I will change my diet. I will take a medication, if that's what's warranted, but I will do I will drink more water. I will change my Lifestyle, I will lose weight. All these are factors in stone risk. And so, you tell the doctor that you are going to do all of it so they understand how motivated you are. When I tell my patients to talk about it in the portal, get in the portal and write, exactly what I'm telling you, I'll help construct emails for patients, tell the doctor this, I've never had a doctor say, "No, you're not getting one." They order them, so make sure you do that. You have to be, whether you have kidney stones or anything else going on in your sweet little body, you have to be an advocate for yourself. You have to. Days are long gone where the doctor's going to brush your hair away from your forlorn face and hold your hand and say, "Let's talk about you." No, they don't got time for that. You must be an advocate for yourself, please know that. 00:06:46 Jeff Sarris Yeah, I mean, oh yeah, and this is the diagnostics. I mean, it's like you wouldn't take your car and just say, "Oh, let's change the tires because we don't know what's wrong with it." Like, we need to know what's going on and actually apply the right service, the right the right diagnosis to then move forward. 00:07:04 Jill Harris I think that's a great analogy, Jeff, because when you, and I just did this, I just took my car in, and when they said, "What do you want me to check?" I almost said nothing, but then I said to myself, then I ain't going to know. So, you know, that's why they're real happy to do all the checks because they're looking for something. So, I would love for doctors to be really looking for something in stone disease. So, and again, some of patients, more than some, will have some genetic issues going on that at least the doctor can rule out. They can rule that out and then work for diet. But we want Is it a diet issue? Is it a genetic issue? Let's do the 24-hour urine collection. By the way, you should be doing blood work, too, to rule out the genetic issues that could be causing stones, too. Okay? So, yeah. ### Interpreting 24-Hour Urine Test Results 00:07:54 Jeff Sarris And now, those actual tests are hard to decipher, correct? I mean, because you offer a service to help people sort of understand, so they take the test, but they don't always get the data in the way that would be useful? Is that how it works? 00:08:08 Jill Harris Yeah, so my service is this, you know, they get a urine collection done, they get the results, and then I help the patient just understand the results. I don't diagnose them as a nurse, I'm legally not allowed to do that, but I will bring up talking points to the patient so then they can bring those I'm actually guiding for them What to ask their doctor so they get really a specific treatment plan and there is no stone left unturned, okay? So, the phone call is only 15 minutes and I'll say, "Look, you can see the reference range, based upon what we want in the stone world, you know, you may want to talk to the doctor and say, 'Yo, doc, I see this is kind of high. What do you think about it?' I understand that diet can change these some of these values. What do you think about it?" So, again, I'm not diagnosing a patient, I can't do that as a nurse, but I give great talking points so they can be brought up at the doctor's office, so the patient can get on a an excellent treatment plan, okay? 00:09:09 Jeff Sarris Yeah, so yeah, they can take control of their health. They can really be sure that they're informed, so then they can have the right conversation. 00:09:15 Jill Harris Yes, that is so very important. So, when I was going through all my chemo and all my stuff for my cancer, I'd go in those office appointments and I was so scared because even though I'm a nurse, I do kidney stones. What the hell do I know about cancer? I've said this before. And also, now I'm the patient, it's really scary. So, based upon all my experience of what I went through As a patient, not an not a nurse, not a mother, not a middle-aged broad, none of these things, as a patient, I was like, this service, I wish I had a service to bring some of my stuff in and talk about it because when you're the patient in the office, you're so scared or anxious or nervous, and people start talking to you in a way like you're supposed to frigging understand what they're saying, So you don't say anything, and then when you leave the office, you're like, "How did I not ask about this or this or this?" So, if you can talk to somebody like a patient advocate, I say more than anything, more than a nurse, I'm a patient advocate. So, if I can teach you how the questions to ask and how to advocate for yourself, boy, that's so helpful, I can't even tell you, and I wish I had that. It would have been much more helpful For me than to then go home and think of all the questions to ask and then good luck, like I said, trying to get a hold of a doctor in our healthcare setting. It's very difficult to get a call back, or even an answer in the portal, so, yeah. I'm I'm I'm very passionate about this, being an advocate for yourself, yeah. Yeah. 00:10:46 Jeff Sarris Definitely. Yeah, and I mean, the urine analysis like service has really helped people, and if anyone wants to check it out and learn more, they can go to kidneystonediet.com. You can find everything that Jill does, everything that she offers, the course, all the free content with the oxalate list, the email list, everything, that's all over kidneystonediet.com. So, Yeah, I think we'll we'll wrap right there today, and yeah, if you're enjoying this podcast, be sure to subscribe wherever you're listening right now. Check us out on YouTube at Kidney Stone Diet. And definitely, like tell your friends. If you if you know someone who's suffering, like this is here to help and we want to reach as many people as we can. ### Free Educational Resources for Stone Prevention 00:11:31 Jill Harris Yeah, and tell your doctor! You know, there's also a handout on under the free resource page on my website that has, you know, "Here's Here Bring this to your doctor's office visit so doctors know." And look, you could say, "Boy, you keep selling stuff, Jill." But here's the thing: even if you just get to if you the handout says, "Hey, there's a free There's the course, of course, there's the Facebook page, there's free stuff. Go to the free stuff, don't pay for a damn thing I talk about. Why do you think we give away so much stuff free? I'm passionate about getting you on the right track. So, whether you pay for my services or you're just getting my free stuff—I like going to websites getting free stuff, I know. There's lots of free stuff. Go there. Start educating Yourself. But there is a handout to give to your doctor so the doctor can say, "Look, there's this broad in Chicago. She's She knows what she's talking about, and she has a lot of free stuff on her website." So, let your doctors know about us. It's important people understand there is help. There They People Kidney stone formers don't know where to turn, so that's that's why I'm saying this now. I'll shut up, okay. 00:12:40 Jeff Sarris No, I mean, that's very important because really like otherwise we're just talking to each other. Exactly! I mean, if no one shares it, if no one's talking about like what you're offering, it's Like there is a financial benefit, of course, I mean, that's you have to you have to eat, you have to pay your rent, but like, I mean, in the end, you're you're truly trying to help people through the course, through the Facebook page, through the I mean, the hundreds of hours you spend every week that's I mean, they're unpaid. You're not getting paid by the hour or anything. This is all entrepreneurial endeavors, so. Yeah. So, we appreciate any support you guys can offer in terms of spreading the word, and I think we'll wrap right there for this week, so thanks again, Jill, and we'll see you next time. 00:13:22 Jill Harris Okay, bye.