Urinary Stent Removal

Today I finally had my stent removed. My kidney transplant was on March 1st, so I’ve had the stent in for about 1 month.  I was glad to know that I was going to get it out…but I will admit that I was deathly afraid!

So this morning I went to the hospital to get blood work done.  Luckily, my Mom was off from work so she was able to come with me. I did my blood work and took my antibiotic (Cipro) afterwards.  We still had a lot of time since my appointment was for 9am, so my Mom and I went to Tim’s to get some tea, coffee, donuts, etc.

As my appointment time came up, we went up for my appointment.  Up there already was one woman I recognized as being a kidney transplant recipient who was on the same hospital floor as me when I had my transplant, as well as the wife of another recipient. I later figured out that she was waiting for her husband who was already in the procedure room getting his stent removed.

I checked in, changed, and chatted with my Mom as well as the wife of the kidney transplant recipient. Shortly after, the husband/transplant recipient literally came strolling from around the corner with (I kid you not) a huge smile on his face, like “That didn’t hurt at all!” Man I was still scared as ever!

The female/transplant recipient who was there before me went in to get her stent removed.  She is much older than me, perhaps in her late 50s or so. She was in and out of the procedure room in about 15 minutes. “Piece of cake!” she exclaimed as she walked by myself and my mother and headed to the change room.

Wow so I guess it will be a piece of cake! Nah I’m not gonna lie, I was STILL nervous as ever.  After a few minutes, a very nice doctor who’s name I cannot remember came out and had me sign a consent form. Shortly after that, a nurse came and called me into the procedure room.  My stomach was swimming because I was so nervous.

The nurse asked me general questions, including whether I had taken my antibiotics, I told her about my hip replacement, and I told her my allergies.

After that, I got onto the procedure table and the nurse put my legs into the stirrups. Eeep! She used a sterile/disposable cloth to cover pretty much the whole area.  It reminds me of when I was getting my fistula and they used sterile cloths to cover my entire arm except for the area the doctor was going to operate on.

The nurse had a needleless syringe full of some sort of numbing gel that she applied after cleaning up the area (use your imagination lol). The doctor came in shortly afterwards and removed all of the tools that he needed and got started.  He told me to take a deep breath as the nurse came and took my hand for support.  He told me to expect perhaps slight discomfort.  It wasn’t painful, just slightly uncomfortable and weird. That discomfort lasted about 3 seconds which was the time it took for the scope to be inserted. There was a screen on my right that showed everything that was going on as the scope obviously had a camera on the end.  When the doctor asked me if I wanted to see what was going on, I quickly told him no, as I had no intention of opening my already tightly squeezed/closed eyes!

*gasp!* That was the sound that I made when the actual stent was removed.  It was uncomfortable for about 2 seconds…and unexpected.  He took it out quickly.  I asked the doctor to see it and he replied “No.”
“No??” I said and laughed. He laughed also, and showed me the stent.  I did not take a picture of it obviously as I was in no position to do so (haha, position :s ) but I did find something similar online:

That’s soooo weird! That thing was there for one month?! Yikes!

The doctor said goodbye gave me a tap/rub on the shoulder just like he did when he first came into the room, and off he went. The nurse let me out of my stirrups and gave me a pamphlet about things I might experience after the removal of the stent.  The symptom I have experienced is more frequently needing to go pee.  I have not experienced some of the other symptoms listed, including slight bleeding as well as burning.  I hope it stays that way.  I have also been told to make sure I drink my 1.5 litres of water daily.

So that’s it! On the pain scale, I’d say it was maybe a 3.5-4 out of 10.  It really wasn’t bad, but I’m also a big chicken.  I’d say that, as usual, I really worked myself up for something super painful and really it wasn’t. It was more weird than painful. I knew what to expect when my stent was removed after my kidney transplant, so that helped too.  I like to know things…not find out after the fact 🙂