New kidney stone surgery aims for cleaner removal in major trial

This study compares a new surgical technique (antegrade flexible ureteroscopy-assisted PCNL) to the standard surgery for removing large, branching kidney stones called staghorn calculi. The goal is to see which method removes more stone fragments and has fewer complications. About 420 adults with these stones will be randomly assigned to one of the two surgeries. The main measure of success is whether a CT scan two days after surgery shows no leftover stone pieces larger than 2 mm.