Meet Ruth Kriz, MSN, APRN
A little Background
Ruth Kriz, MSN, APRN is a nurse practitioner who specializes in threating chronic UTI and interstitial cystitis patients. She has 35 years of experience within the interstitial cystitis community in research and treatment including a funded national study presented at an NIH technical conference. Previously Ruth taught nursing from LPN through Master’s level nurse practitioners and was a test writer for the Pediatric Nurse Practitioner National Boards. She also worked on longitudinal studies with Johns Hopkins Research Center and in several hospitals in coronary care, ICU, and emergency medicine. Her interest in biofilms, genetics, and mycotoxins developed through her discovery of an association between those factors and chronic UTIs and interstitial cystitis. She is currently mentoring a number of physicians and nurse practitioners in utilizing these tools to aid them in their treatment of patients with these chronic health conditions. Practitioners can contact her at ruthinfo@ruthkriz.com with further questions or schedule time to learn her approach and receive testing and treatment recommendations for their patients with these conditions by using this link: https://intakeq.com/booking/qvklyk
It’s More Than Just Testing Urine
In the same way in which you can’t fix a leaky roof if you only plug 1 or 2 holes when there are 10, there is more to breaking the cycle of recurrent UTI’s and eliminating embedded infections, that have resulted in an IC diagnosis. Utilizing DNA urine testing is a good start since standard urine cultures can frequently miss significant infections. This is particularly true for those with infections harbored in biofilms and those driven into cell wall deficient forms. In addition, pathogens colonizing the vaginal tract and those in the semen of sexual partners can contribute to ongoing infections. In order to determine the other contributing factors, a number of additional tests are needed. These include looking at vitamin D levels, reducing ammonia levels that damage the GAG layer of the bladder wall, testing for the genetic issues which make it difficult to break down biofilms, and screening for other factors which can contribute to bladder symptoms and compromised immune function such as mycotoxins and tick-borne infections.