What does the urine test tell us?

The human organism is always with an active metabolism, that is, it is always building or destroying macromolecules, that is, it is always in anabolism or catabolism, which are the processes that make up what we define as metabolic rate.

As these processes are carried out, metabolic wastes are released, which are eliminated by different ways to avoid their accumulation, for example, by the liver or through the skin or feces, and one of the most important is the kidney way.

Thus, with the study of the components found in urine we can intuit what happens in some organs of our body, depending on the presence of some elements and their concentration in urine, hence the importance of the urine test to understand what happens in our body, let's analyze below the most important aspects of this test.

Every act of expulsion that we perform, either evacuating or urinating, contains metabolic waste that must be eliminated from our body, in the case of the kidneys, which are the organs that produce urine, they have a capacity to eliminate certain metabolites, and when this capacity is exceeded, these accumulate in the body, but still a high amount are excreted via the kidneys, which lets us see the amount that is produced is very high.

An example of this is that glucose should not be eliminated through the urinary tract, much less when this is within normal values, but when this value is above 200 mg/dl, even if a glycemia test is not done, but we find glucose in urine, we must know that the person has at least that value of glycemia, and obviously it can be more.

It is important to consider all that we find in a normal way in a urine test to know from these normal values when it is altered.

Next I will describe what we usually find as the most important characteristics in a urine test, and how they can be altered, which makes us think of specific diseases.

• Appearance: when we see the urine it should not have fragments of anything, it should be like clear water, otherwise we would be at the other extreme, which we mean that it is cloudy. The latter is indicative of some abnormalities.

For example, when a person has kidney stones, cloudy urine is usually present. Something similar also occurs when we are in the presence of a severe urinary tract infection. Dehydration produces a very concentrated urine, which may be cloudy.

• Color: color is closely related to the cloudy character of the urine. A clear example of color alteration is when there is a high production of bilirubin, which makes the urine very dark. Liver disease can also cause changes in urine color. Kidney disease can also cause changes in color.

In this way, depending on the color it has, we could intuit where the complication or disease is in the organism.

• Smell: This is a characteristic that we can all perceive at the moment of urination, since it is an odor that we recognize. An infection can cause a foul odor, a sweet odor can tell us that we are in the presence of poorly controlled diabetes, or other metabolic diseases.

We could have abundant presence of ammonia due to a bad processing of this component.

Pixabay/ Author: kkolosov

• Acidity level (pH): this value usually suggests many diseases. The normal pH of urine is slightly acidic, on average it is 6, although it usually has variations between 5 and 8.

But when a very acidic or very alkaline pH is present, it may indicate that there is usually some type of metabolic alteration. Very often the alkaline tells us about calcium carbonate kidney stones, for example. And if it is very acidic it may even indicate problems in urea metabolism.

• Presence of substances that are not usually in the urine: In the urine we usually do not find any type of cells in normal conditions, sometimes, and only sometimes, some epithelial cells of the urinary tract. But in addition to these cells we could find hemoglobin, erythrocytes, glucose, ketones, among other substances that are usually not present in a normal way.

Therefore, each of these particles or cells will indicate a particular probable disease. Or there may also be filtration of certain molecules at the renal level, which are not normal, when a person presents fever, and not meaning that he/she has a specific disease.

• Presence of microorganisms: this is important, because it usually speaks directly of an infection. Which may require antibiotic, antifungal or antiparasitic treatment.

Pixabay/ Author: HeungSoon

An examination is a guide, and in the case of uroanalysis it is a very important tool that helps us not only to know how the urinary system is working, but to a great extent a good part of our organism as far as metabolism is concerned.

But always, any examination must go hand in hand with a pertinent physical examination, and a correct interrogation is essential. This allows us to see what the patient has to say, from when he/she feels the way he/she feels, what other symptoms he/she has presented, in order to get a diagnostic idea.

Also keep in mind that there are tests such as complete hematology, which gives us great clues that hand in hand with the uroanalysis, physical examination and interrogation should allow us to have a better diagnostic impression and finally, give the necessary help to the person who goes in search of solutions.

Thank you very much for reading this publication, I hope it will be of help to you.

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• Links consulted

• Urine samples and urinalysis

• URINE ANALYSIS REVISITED: A REVIEW

• Urinalysis Interpretation