A man’s four-year battle with an enormous hernia has ended with him unable to work or lift his grandchildren.

Ron Bell has suffered pain and anguish caused by a giant lump on the right of his abdomen since his nightmare began on May 30, 2004.

He was admitted to Medway Hospital with appendicitis and had a routine operation there – but he contracted MRSA, which he believes caused the infection to grow to 21 inches.

All through the rest of 2004, and most of 2005, Mr Bell paid countless visits to the hospital to try to get treatment for the hernia.

On September 9, 2005, he collapsed at his home in Anne Boleyn Close, Eastchurch, because of the pain.

The 50-year-old said: “After I collapsed, I was sent to Maidstone Hospital, and they couldn’t believe what they were looking at. It had just got bigger and bigger all the time.

“They couldn’t just cut it off because it was my stomach and bowel in that lump and they needed to push it all back in.” Maidstone Hospital took control and after several setbacks, including Mr Bell being told he had to lose six stone before they would operate, the operation finally took place in October 2006.

They carried out keyhole surgery, and former boxing coach Mr Bell had to return to the hospital every two weeks at first, and then his visits were reduced to every six weeks, until May 13 this year.

But although Mr Bell is glad he is still here – as he had been told on a number of occasions that if the operation didn’t happen soon he wouldn’t live to see another 18 months – he is still not recovered.

He said: “I’m finished for life, it’s ruined me.

“All the top of my thigh and top of my leg is dead where they cut the nerves.

“I cannot work at all, I can only walk a certain distance and when I’m driving I have to stop and get up if my leg starts playing up.

“I get pain with any sort of lifting, even a couple of heavy carrier bags, and it’s hard to pick my two young grandchildren up.”