A spot urine sample is limited in its ability to evaluate metabolic risk but may provide useful information. Therefore spot urine and serum testing shouldn't replace 24-h urine analysis to comprehensively assess a child′s metabolic risk for recurrent stone disease. Even better, one should use two 24-hour collections rather than only one to avoid misleading variations which are predicted.
Spot urine sampling is an alternative method for metabolic evaluation of urolithiasis, especially in children. The European urolithiasis guideline confirm that with this explanation: ''Spot urine samples are an alternative method of sampling, particularly when 24-h urine collection is difficult, for example, in non-toilet trained children.''