AN 11-year-old Watchet schoolgirl has become the first patient in the country to have kidney surgery using specialist 3D equipment.

The girl, known only as Libby, was suffering from kidney and bladder complications which meant she was often in severe pain.

Surgeons were able to operate on her faster and with greater accuracy using 3D technology during keyhole surgery and the technical breakthrough means that hundreds more children across the country could now have faster surgery.

One in 200 children are born with stretched kidneys, but in Libby’s case it was not detected until she was older when she was found to have a blockage in the tube that connects kidneys to the bladder, and her pain was becoming more frequent and stronger.

Her mother, Holly, said the family had found Libby’s situation ’quite worrying’ the more it escalated.

Specialists at Bristol Royal Hospital for Children used 3D laparoscopic equipment, which is more commonly used for brain surgery, to correct the problem.

Libby’s paediatric urologist Mark Woodward said the 3D equipment, which costs £20,000, enabled surgeons to perform the operation faster and with greater accuracy.

Dr Woodward said Libby’s surgery would normally take between two to three hours but using 3D equipment this should be reduced by 20 per cent.

Libby’s father, Andrew, said his daughter was ’back on her feet and recovering well’. When told she was the first child in the country to have surgery using the new technique, Libby’s response was: "That’s pretty cool!"