Age-specific prevalence of kidney stones in Chinese urban inhabitants.

The data on prevalence of kidney stones are lacking in China. We enrolled a total of 1,169,651 urban inhabitants across China in 2008 to detect if they are experiencing kidney stones by ultrasound diagnosis. Calibrated after the Chinese population census, the overall prevalence rate was estimated to be 4.0 %, 4.8 % in men and 3.0 % in women. A male predominance was found in all age group . The prevalence in the north (4.1 %) was slightly higher than that in the south (4.0 %). This study provides a quantitative and updated estimate of the kidney stone prevalence in a nationally representative sample.