Women twice as likely to suffer UTI

Washington - Women are more than twice as likely as men to suffer from urinary tract infections (UTI) caused by kidney stones, says a new finding.

Henry Ford Hospital researchers also found significantly higher rates of complications following one of two treatments for the effects of urolithiasis, or stones in the kidneys and urinary tract, based on premilinary studies.

Not only were the women far more susceptible to infection when they develop urolithiasis, the study also showed the rising incidence of sepsis, a potentially fatal inflammation triggered by the infection, the journal European Urology reported.

The rate of related deaths, however, held steady, which the researchers attributed to "broad improvement in the management of sepsis and the critically ill," according to a Henry Ford statement.

"The research study was conducted because the rate of infection related to urolithiasis was not known, and evidence was unclear about the best method for treating it," said Jesse Sammon, urology resident at Henry Ford's Vattikuti Urology Institute, who led the study.

The study involved nearly 400,000 adult patients hospitalized with infected urolithiasis from 1999-2009, under the Nationwide Inpatient Sample, the largest all-payer inpatient care database in the US.

Researchers then determined how often they were treated with either of two techniques -- retrograde ureteral catheterization, or RUC, and percutaneous nephrostomy, or PCN.

In RUC, a catheter is inserted through the ureter to drain blocked urine and relieve pressure on the kidney. With PCN, a surgical instrument is used to pierce the patient's back, and then the kidney.

During the 10-year period under study, the incidence of infected urolithiasis in women increased from 15.5 per 100,000, to 27.6. In men, there was an increase of 7.8 per 100,000, to 12.1.

Related sepsis rose from 6.9 percent of urolithiasis patients to 8.5 percent, and severe sepsis increased from 1.7 percent to 3.2 percent.