A friend of mine had a kidney stone. He got rid of it via Chinese herbs and yoga. After the kidney stone passed, a prostate infection went away. Here’s what he saved himself from by solving the problem himself:
1) A CAT scan. This particular scan would have been the equivalent of 18 years worth of (background) radiation (according to the FDA web site), all in 45 min or an hour.  Also, I would have had to take an iodine contract material.  This latter is (a) at least mildly nephrotoxic in healthy people (and I was already having kidney problems) and (b) accumulates in the thyroid and, being radio-opaque, causes deposition of larger amounts of x-radiation energy into the thyroid.  This latter is being blamed in the medical literature for the explosion in thyroid cancer rates over the last few years.  (Apparently they have had this problem before, prior to the advent of CT’s, when iodine was used as contrast, and then multiple x-rays were taken.)  I also learned that in Europe, there are controls with regard to how much x-ray a person can be exposed to. This means that they do not do these extensive CT’s, but employ MRI’s instead. The latter are not just less dangerous, but also much better diagnostic tools; but they are more expensive. As a result the US health insurance companies refuse to pay for them.
(2) Taking Cipro, which is what I had been given after the first round of antibiotics failed to work (leaving me a second positive urine test).  Cipro was the antibiotic given to the postal workers as a prophylaxis, when the scare about anthrax in the mail was going on. Were it not for the fact that they were all given the same thing, all started having the same symptoms, and then all started talking to each other, we would probably have never had the massive class-action law suits that forced the FDA to put a “black box” warning on this drug.  How bad could an antibiotic be? Well, it seems that some people are having their tendons release from the bone, often the Achilles tendon, sometimes within 24 hours of starting the drug.  And that is only what the FDA is now admitting to. On the web, you find that the really serious problems are neurological. Lots of what were very high functioning people are reporting on the web very similar effects.
Not understanding the Post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy is even more dangerous. I’ll stick with the science for now.
Do you know what herbs he used?
Yes, but being your own doctor can be dangerous, too. Here’s an interesting article from the Los Angeles Times about people who erroneously think they’ve found a cure (or at least at treatment) for autism:
https://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-he-autism-parents7-2009dec07,0,7076900.story
Allergies, fungal infections, kidney stones — these things come and go, or fluctuate in severity. Given the noise in the signal, and an “N” of 1, how is one to know that changing socks, or eating kim chee, or what-have-you is the reason for any improvement that one sees? I’d like to hear Seth’s thoughts about this.
Ralph, my point isn’t what he did to get rid of a kidney stone. As you say it’s hard to tell. My point is that, at least in this case, the conventional medical treatments he was offered had big costs that many people don’t know about.
Tom, no I don’t know what herbs he used. He believes it’s more likely that the yoga was what did it.
I agree that doing your own research and taking responsibility for your healthcare is important, but this is a particularly bad example. Kidney stones have significantly different courses depending on type and size, so comparing two cases is difficult.
Avoiding unnecessary CT scans is good, but make the diagnostic alternatives clear. Using, e.g. an simple x-ray (about 1/50 the radiation) and/or ultrasound. Simply leaving it undiagnosed is bad, since it shares symptoms with other conditions (like bladder cancer) which do need treatment.
And the Chinese herbs need to vetted, just like any other treatment medicine.
Greg, yeah, avoiding unnecessary CT scans is pretty obvious. It’s far less obvious how dangerous Cipro is. And the increase in thyroid cancer and the possibility it is caused by the iodine used in those scans is likewise an important new piece of info.
Wow, I had no idea Cipro was so dangerous.
My point is that owning your health care often means different conventional treatments, rather than none. X-ray, ultrasound, or MRI instead of CT. Using antibiotics other than (fluro)quilolones where possible. (Actually, I’m confused why a kidney stone was treated antibiotics at all. Even if it’s associated with infection, usually getting it out is the key treatment)
A healthy lifestyle is the first step, of course, but Chinese herbs and yoga is a poor summary of “being your own doctor”.
why were antibiotics involved? Because of a prostate infection that wouldn’t go away. It went away soon after he got rid of the kidney stone.
An FDA advisory panel just recommended that the warning for Covidien’s Optimark and GE’s Omnisca—drugs in the family of medications known as gadolinium-based contrast agents (DBCAs)—be updated to restrict their use in patients with severe kidney disease because of the potential for an increased risk of nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NSF). NSF causes thickening of the skin and organs. GBCAs carry a strong “black box” warning. This site has good information on this issue: https://www.gadolinium-mri.com/index.html

Agree with Greg – being your own advocate is not bad advice. But your claims on what was saved are exaggerated or false: 1) many stones will pass w/o treatment, some may not 2) you would do an ultrasound, not a CT first, for suspected kidney stones 3) tetracyclines or trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole are also commonly prescribed in addition to cipro (which by and large has a good safety record).