Little Zoe's anxious wait for life saving transplant operation
Parents told their baby daughter needs a new heart
(Story dated: Thursday, January 22, 2004)

Allan Stanger cradles his seriously ill daughter, Zoe in Glasgow's Yorkhill Hospital. Little Zoe needs a heart transplant operation.

An Orkney baby has been placed near the top of the UK’s waiting list for a life saving heart transplant operation.

The parents of seven-month-old twin Zoe Stanger, have been told that their daughter has to have the operation or she will almost certainly die.

Karen and Allan Stanger, of Guardhouse Park, Stromness, now face an agonising wait for a donated organ, which tragically has to come from another baby.

The couple are currently with Zoe, who is in intensive care and heavily sedated, at the special cardiac unit in Glasgow’s Yorkhill Hospital.

Their nightmare began six weeks ago when Zoe contracted what seemed like an everyday chest infection.

“She was not getting better and she started choking. We phoned the doctor and we were flown straight to Aberdeen,” said 33-year-old Allan, speaking from Glasgow this week.

Zoe, whose twin sister, Tamzin and three-year-old sister, Alicia are staying with grandparents in Stromness, was x-rayed and it was discovered she had an enlarged heart.

The family were then transferred to the Sick Children’s Unit at Yorkhill.

“She has the heart of a six to ten-year-old,” Allan, a chef, continued. “They said initially that it could get better on its own, there was a one-in-three chance.

“She was stabilised with drugs, which does not help her heart but helps her cope with her heart – the drugs open up her arteries to help the blood flow.”

Zoe seemed to be improving and the family were allowed home on Monday of last week.

Allan explained: “It was in the early hours of the morning she took a turn for the worse. We went straight into the Balfour Hospital.”

A specially-equipped plane, a doctor and nurse was flown north from Edinburgh and Zoe and Karen were taken back to the Glasgow hospital. Allan joined them the following day.

“Her heart has enlarged again. There is no chance of it getting better,” he said.

A specialist from the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle has assessed Zoe and she is regarded as a top priority on the heart transplant waiting list.

“A heart could come from anywhere in Britain, Germany or France – anywhere within two and a half hours of Newcastle, where they will perform the transplant if all goes well,” Allan continued.

“The worst thing is that something has to happen to someone else.

“The oldest child they can use a heart from is a one-year-old we have been told. You never think you are going to need anything like this.”

He added: ‘We do not carry donor cards, but we will after this. We are just wishing now that everybody would carry one.”

The family never believed that they would find themselves in this situation and appealed for others to think about donating organs which could, ultimately, save lives.

“We never thought it would happen to us but it has. Please think about donating your organs, not just for us, but there are lots of other children here who need organs,” Allan said.

Zoe and Tamzin were born six weeks early, in Dundee, and both weighed in at about 5lb 6ozs. Zoe did develop a few problems and was placed on a ventilator for three days.

She had fluid on her left lung and after a couple of weeks at home was rushed to the Edinburgh Sick Children’s Hospital with a chest infection. Doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with her and all test results were negative, Allan explained. She had been clear since then.

Her mum Karen added: “I just wish we could get on with it, but we have to play the waiting game.”

The couple have been staying in a flat, near to the hospital, which is run by a charity.

“We would never have been able to afford to stay in Glasgow if it weren’t for these charity-run houses. Zoe is on a ventilator and pretty heavily sedated so we can come across for dinner and tea. It is hard, the days are really long, but you do get used to it, you have to,” Allan said.

The couple are hopeful that Karen, 29, will be able to travel back to Orkney on Monday to spend some time with their other children.

“Alicia is finding it especially difficult. She doesn’t want to talk to us on the phone now. Tamzin is too young to realise what is going on,” he added.