Effects of pyruvate salts, pyruvic acid, and bicarbonate salts in preventing experimental oxalate urolithiasis in rats.

Sodium pyruvate, potassium pyruvate, pyruvic acid, sodium bicarbonate and potassium bicarbonate were added to a calcium-oxalate lithogenic diet (a glycolic-acid diet) in order to determine their effects in preventing lithogenicity. Male Wistar-strain rats who had been fed the glycolic-acid diet developed marked urinary calculi within four weeks. Rats in the sodium and potassium pyruvate groups had, however, almost no stones in the urinary system. Rats in the bicarbonate and pyruvic-acid groups showed slightly less effect than those in the pyruvate groups. Urinary oxalate excretion was high in all the groups during the experiment. The urinary oxalate concentration was relatively higher in the sodium-pyruvate group, and significantly higher in the potassium-pyruvate group, than in the glycolic-acid group. Urinary citrate excretion was high both in the pyruvate and bicarbonate groups; the urinary citrate concentration was, however, significantly higher in the pyruvate groups than in the bicarbonate groups at the fourth experimental week. The urinary calcium and magnesium concentrations were irrelevant to the diets administered. Therefore, it can be concluded that pyruvate salts inhibit urinary calculi formation, not by decreasing oxalate synthesis, but by increasing the urinary citrate concentration; bicarbonate salts work in the same manner, but a little less effectively.