I am a 29 year old female with severe pain in my left flank area that sometimes travels down to my left fromt abdomen(groin area?). Sometimes the pain comes on very sharp- like someone is stabbing me and othertimes it is constant like a fist is pushing against my left kidney. At 16 yo I had surgery to correct bilateral reflux-(I didn't have symptoms of reflux- this was caught by accident when I had an ovarian cycst at age 15). This left me with a smaller, scarred left kidney. Since then I have had increasing amount of kidney infections. 2 years ago I had 5 kidney infections in a year. They put me on daily antibiotics and sent me to a urologist. During a routine visit my left kidney was sore (start of the pain). About as month later I got a stabbing pain out of nowhere- I literally fell to the floor. Dr thoguht it was kidney stones, but all tests came back negative. Since then I have been dealing with this pain. I have had many tests (IVP, CATscan, check for reflux, blood work) and all have been negative. They also did a nuclear scan showing left kidney function at 24% (said it was a good number for the size of the kidney). Last July, following a hunch, my DR put in a stent to the left kidney and this helped a lot. Pain disappeared for a couple months. In January I had another kidney infection (2 rounds of antibiotics- cipro and levaquin) and the pain came back. I had another nuclear scan and now left kidney function is downto 20% (in less than a year) and decreased blood flow to this kidney. I am going in for a Whittaker Test on Monday. What will that show? DR is talking about removing my left kidney, but doesn't want to until he is sure why I have the pain and why kidney is deteriorating.
I would like your opinion on what could be going on. What could be causing the function of my kidney to be decreasing? Why am I getting pain like there is a stone when everything is negative? I would like to start a family, what would having the kidney removed do to those plans? If they can't find a reason why my left kidney is failing, then how do I know my right kidney won't fail also? My blood pressure is excellent. No proteins or anything in my urine. My creatinine is 1.2. I have been told that everything looks greats- except for my pain. The only way I can get through the day is by taking percocet, but I hate taking them. I have tried many other pain killers, but they don't work. I am exhausted, but I don't know if that is a symptom or a result that the pain wakes me up during the night. Also, somedays i fell the need to urinate almost constantly. Sometime even though I just finished going. Other days they urgency isn't there. And, since the kidney infection in January I have been retaining a lot of water. I would appreciate any insight you may have.