'I have hundreds of kidney stones'

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By Jane Elliott Health reporter, BBC News

Trudy has frequent pain from her stones

Trudy O'Neill has collected pots of unusual stones.

The stones are shaped like coral and vary from the size of grit to as large as five millimetres.

"They are not as pretty or as expensive as diamonds, but they are just as hard to come by," said Trudy.

For the last 10 years Trudy's body has developed hundreds of these kidney stones - some have been passed painfully through her urine, others have been removed by doctors.

Regular stones

Trudy, aged 45, from Essex, has collected them all.

Ten years ago, following a thrombosis, Trudy had to have most of her small bowel removed. She now has short bowel syndrome which leads to changes in metabolism making her form kidney stones very frequently, due to poor absorption of calcium and bile.

I have an illness that takes up a lot of my life but it is not everything I am Trudy O'Neill

"Other people who get kidney stones are generally unlucky and get one or two," she said.

"I get three or four a year if not more.

"They are painful, I have heard the pain is similar to giving birth.

"If I am about to pass a stone through my urine I feel quite unwell for a couple of days, I can feel it coming through and can feel it coming out.

"I have passed stones up to 1 millimetre which does not sound very big but it is when you consider the hole it has got to come through - it is like a boulder."

Flushed out

Tiny kidney stones generally leave the body through the urine.

If stones grow too large - usually at least 5 millimetres - they can cause obstruction and pain.

Typical symptoms include a colicky pain in the lower back. Sometimes this pain can be so intense it may lead to fainting bouts or the person feeling crippled by the pain.

Trudy has had almost every type of treatment to help her remove the stones.

She has had lithotripsy, a non invasive treatment which involves using ultrasonic shock-waves. Many shock waves are centred onto the stone where they create a combined shock wave strong enough to break the stone.

Trudy has hundreds of stones

This fragments the stone into tiny pieces which pass out with the urine without causing her too much pain, but is only suitable for 80% of stones.

Trudy has also had a flexible ureteroscopy, which allows the urologists to check her kidneys, provide the right assessment regarding stone formation, and treat smaller stones with ultra thin laser-fibers, before deciding on further treatment approaches.

She has also had a stent, which is a small tube between the bladder and the inside of the kidney which will provide temporary relief of a blocked kidney. Treatment with a stent has helped Trudy save her failing right kidney which became blocked and seriously infected by a stone.

Award win

Barts and the Royal London, where Trudy is currently treated, has recently won an award for its excellence in the field of treating kidney stones.

The European Board of Urology (EBU) recently named the hospital's stone service a centre of excellence.

The stone service (known as endourology) is led by consultant urologist Noor Buchholz. He said that although kidney stones are common - affecting one in 12 in the UK that Trudy's was an exceptional case.

KIDNEY STONES Stones (or calculi) can form in any part of the urinary tract, from the kidneys to the ureters (the tubes leading out of the kidneys), to the bladderKidney stones may form when salts or minerals, normally found in urine, become solid crystals inside the kidneyThere about 40,000 cases each year in the UK and stones are three times more likely in men than women

"She had a blood clot in her bowel and because of this bowel removal she had metabolic changes and these cause her to have stones like other people change t-shirts," he said.

"She has several stones in both kidneys and we see her three to four times a year and treat her at least once or twice.

"Despite multiple operations she bounces back and recovers with remarkable strength and amazing good humour. She is an incredibly brave person."

Trudy admits though that the pain can be grinding, but said she won't let it depress her.

"I take morphine for pain and at times that won't touch it.

"But I am a glass half full sort of person not a glass half empty and I make the best of a bad job.

"I suppose after 10 years I am kind of used to it, if you can ever get used to it. I accept my illness and live with it but not because of it."