Charging so much for an IV of water just shows how precious water is, especially if it’s salted. For patients that are not covered by health insurance, kidney stone treatment usually costs less than $500 to have the stone pass naturally while being monitored by a doctor, and possibly include prescription medication. However, kidney stone treatment can cost from under $10,000 to $20,000 or more for surgical removal or extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy (ESWL) which is the most common method of treatment for stones that are actually in the kidney rather than the ureters or bladder. In this method, the patient is placed under local or general anesthesia and lies in a tub of warm water or a special cushion on a table, then X-rays or ultrasound are used to locate the kidney stone, after which up to 2,000 shock waves are passed through the patient to crush the stone.
