white blood cells, what does it mean?

[copyeditor]

is it a sign of infection or IC? he's going to do a culture, but i JUST finished a course of antibiotics. can you have white blood cells in your urine just from having IC? or is it a definite sign of infection?

*still subscribing to the notion that low-grade, undetectable bacteria causes "IC."*

[Katrina]

yes it can be just from IC. Many IC patients always have white blood cells in their urine. The only definate sign of a bacterial infection is bacteria.
:grouphug:

[Babs RN]

White cells in urine are pretty constant, due to chronic inflammation. The other things they look for to diagnose an infection are nitrites and leukocytes. In addition until the culture comes back(and with the UTI the bacteria count is 100,000 cfl/u or greater. Clean catch UAs that aren't done properly can skew the results as well.

Hugs,
Barb :grouphug:

[MarthaB]

:) Hi, I have almost always white and red bloodcells in my urine, but cultered urine test come back negative, and the count is higher if I flare, It used to spook me, but I am used to it now.
Martha