OBJECTIVE: Urolithiasis, a common problem in medicine, poses a significant burden with prevalenceof 1-15%. Potassium citrate therapy has become one of the cornerstones of medical stone managementwith hypocitraturia being the most common metabolic problem in stone formers. The authorsdetermined the effects of potassium citrate on urinary metabolic profiles and its impact on stoneburden among Filipino stone formers. PATIENTS AND METHODS: This is a prospective, cohort study in patients seen at the UST Hospital between2016 and 2018. Twenty-four hour urine citrate levels, stone sizes and urine pH pre-therapy and post-therapy were analyzed. RESULTS: Significant changes in urinary citrate, pH and stone sizes were noted as soon as 3 months afterthe onset of therapy. These changes included increase in urinary pH (6.1 to 6.7; p=0.001), increase inurinary citrate (109.1 to 253.4mg/day; p<0.001) and decrease in stone size (0.56 to 0.37cm; p=0.037).The changes in the urine citrate and the changes in the stone size were not correlated using the Pearsoncorrelation scatter plot. CONCLUSION Potassium citrate therapy provides a significant alkali and citraturic treatment among Filipino stone formers. However, there is no significant correlation between changes in stone size and changes in urine citrate level.

: It has been proposed that Metabolic Syndrome causes an inadvertent lowering of PSA levels in affected individuals. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to determine the effect of metabolic syndrome on the serum PSA level. METHODS: Literature search was done using MEDLINE and Cochrane databases. The primary outcome measure was serum prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels. Secondary outcome measures included prostate volume, plasma volume, and PSA mass density. Mean differences were computed using Review Manager 5.3 software. RESULTS: There were six articles available for analysis with a total of 33,775 in metabolic syndrome group (MS) and 70,305 in non-metabolic syndrome group (NM). Overall, there was no significant difference between the PSA levels between MS and NM group. The prostate and plasma volume were significantly higher in the MS compared with NM, having mean difference of 2.95 mL (95% CI, 1.41 to 4.49) and 162.68 mL (95% CI, 120.24 to 205.11), respectively. However, there were no significant difference in the PSA mass density between metabolic and non-metabolic syndrome. CONCLUSION Metabolic syndrome does not affect PSA levels and PSA mass density, despite increase in hemodilution.