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Black Color Urine
بقول ابن سینا: اصود زعفرانی و اصود اخضر
According to the Modern Medicine
Black urine can be terrifying. As with all urine colors, there are variety of causes of black urine, some causes are harmless and some are much more worrisome. There I describe some of the most common causes of black urine with their scientific justifications but always remember, there could be a lot more than these causes that only your physician can diagnose after a proper macro and microscopic urine examination and history taking.
Melanuria
Excessive Melanin can be caused by sun damage or overexposure to the sun. Normally, “there is no melanin in urine, so if you have melanin in urine, then most probably body is producing too much of it. This creates a medical condition called Melanuria”.
Alkaptonuria
This is caused by an “inherited recessive gene disorder in which the body doesn’t do a good job breaking down the amino acid called Tyrosine. So it starts to build up in your body tissues and joints, and it can also come out in urine tinting it black”.
Muscle damage
Over-exertion is one of the common ways you may hurt yourself. Aside from the pain, massive release of myoglobin into urine could actually cause black urine.
Malaria or Black Water Fever
“Blackwater fever can come about when blood cells are being destroyed at a rapid pace, and hemoglobin, which is usually inside the blood cells, is being released directly into the bloodstream and then into the urine. Plasmodium Falciparum enters the blood cells and literally makes them burst. It’s thought that Blackwater Fever is a possible complication as body’s immune system reacts to the use of quinine to treat malaria.” But luckily nature had saved us once again by producing “Artemisia absinthium” plant. Today a drug called “artesunate” is used to treat malaria which is much more effective than quinine and has a benefit of not causing Blackwater.
Additional microscopic lab testing is recommended for urine specimens that turn black on standing, please refer to your physician or to a registered health care provider.
Suggested Readings
- Altmann, P., & Mansell, M. A. (1980). Black urine. Postgraduate medical journal, 56(662), 877-878.
- Santos, A. L., Ibrahim, G., Mount, S., Thomas, C., & Weise, W. J. (2009). The Case∣ A Caucasian male with dark skin, black urine, and acute kidney injury. Kidney international, 76(12), 1295-1296.
- Peker, E., Yonden, Z., & Sogut, (2008). From darkening urine to early diagnosis of alkaptonuria. Indian Journal of Dermatology, 74(6), 700.
- Avicenna’s Canon of medicine by O. C. Gruner.
Tag:Urology in Canon