Lots of sex makes passing kidney stones ‘pleasurable,’ faster: doctors
To treat kidney stones, try sex — it’s doctors’ orders.
Other than drinking water and waiting, researchers have revealed a much more pleasurable way to rid yourself of kidney stones: by having sex or masturbating three to four times per week.
Kidney stones are an unfortunate reality for many — one-tenth of Brits and Americans suffer from them.
Typically, those with small kidney stones are told to drink lots of fluids and take medications that relax muscles in the urinary tract, such as Flomax, to speed up the passing process.
If a stone gets too big, surgery is usually required to either manually remove them or break it into smaller pieces to be passed.
Now, there’s a much less invasive and uncomfortable approach to passing them as quickly as possible.
Doctors in Indonesia have found that orgasms and ejaculation lead to bladder neck contraction and relaxation, which could also help pass kidney stones. As muscles relax, urine — along with kidney stones — may easily pass through the urethra.
“Performing sexual intercourse or masturbation for three to four times a week is beneficial for promoting spontaneous expulsion of distal ureteral stones,” according to the report, titled “Pleasurable ways to spontaneously expulse distal ureteral stones,” in the Journal of Sexual Medicine.
Urologists at Universitas Airlangga in Surabaya were curious to find out if sexual activity affected how many kidney stones were passed and how long it took. They reviewed five studies with 406 participants who were told either to have sex or masturbate three to four times per week or completely abstain from both.
Turns out, making whoopee worked. The results showed that the rate of kidneys passing stones was 5.7 higher and expelled faster in the group that was sexually active.
Sex also helped mitigate the discomfort caused by kidney stones, with 62% fewer participants in that group requiring pain relief. Moreover, those who would’ve needed to undergo a procedure to break up the kidney stones dropped by 20%.