Patient celebrates 20 years after op

Twenty years ago Hazel Frost underwent a "miracle" operation which changed her life forever.

Mrs Frost, of Church Stretton, was one of the first in the region to undergo a life-saving kidney transplant. Today she will be enjoying a glass of red wine with her husband, Eric, to celebrate two decades of healthy life. And she is keen to spread the word on the benefits of the op.

"I just wish everyone who needs it could have one - it has changed my life. It was just a miracle," she said.

Mrs Frost, who ran the Beaumont Cafe in Church Stretton for 30 years, originally underwent an operation to remove kidney stones.

"The next morning the surgeon came and said that when they operated they found the kidney was full of stones and the other had scarring and could not take the load," she said.

Three years of dialysis followed.

"I was on dialysis four times a day - you cannot do anything or go anywhere, but it kept me alive," she added.

Mrs Frost said that nurses had cheered when they heard a donor had been found because they knew that she did not have much time left.

"I didn't know anything about the donor except that they must have come from quite long way away because when they phoned me to tell me that they had found me a kidney they said I needn't come straight away because it wouldn't arrive for a while," she added.

Mrs Frost said that when she did arrive at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham in 1988 she was rushed straight into surgery.

Doctors then thought that she had had a heart attack because her blood pressure dropped so low during the four-hour operation.

The surgeon even told her that after 40 years experience he had never known a patient survive with such low blood pressure.

After the operation Mrs Frost spent a week intensive care - the first step on the road to recovery.

Although Mrs Frost still has to take steroids, she said that nowadays, her consultant says that if it wasn't in her medical notes then he would never have known that she had had the transplant.

"I would not have had a life without it.

"It is most important that people carrying donor cards - it really does save lives," she added.