Currently, there are no NICE guidelines for the treatment of chronic UTIs – only for acute attacks. There is a difference in these conditions which needs to be acknowledged.

 

We have been fortunate enough to access appropriate antibiotic treatment for our condition. Our aim is to help millions of other sufferers by raising awareness of this long ignored issue. Urinary tract infection does not discriminate - it affects young and old - women, men and even small children. It is a worldwide condition but it affects hundreds of thousands of people in the UK alone.

 

Doctors rely heavily on the standard dipstick and mid-stream urine (MSU) tests to diagnose UTIs. This is where the real problem lies. These tests have been used since the 1950s and they have been proven to miss over 50% of infections.

 

Patients go to their GP with symptoms of a UTI and are asked to give a urine sample for analysis. Frequently,  the results are negative; patients are told they do not have an infection and are either given no treatment at all or are prescribed a short course of antibiotics. This is because doctors are  not always aware that the so-called ‘gold standard’ of tests can miss between 50-80% of infections.

 

Left untreated the infection worsens and the patient’s condition deteriorates. increasing pain drives them to seek help from other specialists, including urologists. They can sometimes end up seeing several consultants and are persuaded to undergo tests, scans and other invasive procedures. They are offered a variety of treatments that may or may not help their symptoms. The real problem is that none of this is dealing with their illness for what it really is...a bacterial infection.

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​We as a campaign group want the medical community to recognise that these tests are not fit for purpose. All too often they discount white blood cells in a patient’s urine; a telltale sign of infection.

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We want to encourage research into improving the accuracy of the tests. We also want to see more centres in the UK dedicated to the effective treatment of chronic urinary tract infections.

We are doing this for the benefit of everyone because we don’t want anyone else to see their quality of life destroyed by the debilitating symptoms we have all endured.
 

Living with this condition day in day out is extremely debilitating and painful. The medical establishment needs to accept that the current diagnostic urine tests have been discredited for a long time. It is time for something to be done about this. Urine tests must be changed so that all infection is diagnosed and treated effectively.

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Please join us and help us to help hundreds of thousands of people in the UK.