Nephrasty tubes-urine tubes

Hi Sarah AC

Welcome to the Online Community here at Macmillan. I hope you find it a helpful place to access support and ask questions. My name is Vanessa and I am one of the information nurses.

Here at the Macmillan Support Line, we can give general advice and support. We are independent from the NHS and don’t have access to medical records so can’t give personalised information.  

A nephrostomy tube is used to drain urine from the kidney into a bag on the outside of the body. Nephrostomies are normally used when the tube which drains urine from the kidney into the bladder is blocked.

Nephrostomy tubes are sometimes capped to see if urine can drain from the kidney into the bladder normally.

If the tube is capped and the urine cannot drain from the kidney to bladder naturally, the urine can build up in the kidney potentially causing the symptoms you describe. It is best, however, to talk to your husband’s hospital team about this as they can explain the symptoms in relation to his own clinical information.

I can see you find it difficult at times getting information. Sometimes specialist nurses are allocated to people with a cancer diagnosis. If your husband has an allocated specialist nurse, you could try contacting them rather than the Dr and they should be able to answer your questions.

You don’t say what your husband’s diagnosis is but please do remember within the online community we have forums for most cancer types and these can be useful places to talk to people who have similar experiences to you and your husband.

I hope you find this information helpful. You can also always call one of our nurses directly if you want to talk over your concerns or require any further support.

Take care

Vanessa G, Cancer Information Nurse Specialist 

You can also speak with the Macmillan Support Line team of experts. Phone free on 0808 808 0000 (7 days a week, 8am-8pm) or send us an email. 

REF: VG/AR