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Meet some of our patients
Dylan, age 8
From four years old, Dylan started suffering from dizzy spells and collapsing. He would go blue in the mouth and his chest would enlarge. Doctors performed an ECG test (electrocardiogram) to check heart activity and immediately realised there was something seriously wrong.
On what his mother Michelle describes as “the worst day of my life”, Dylan was transferred to Great Ormond Street Hospital. He was diagnosed with Primary Pulmonary Hypertension. A Hickman Line was inserted to deliver drugs direct to his major arteries to slow down the life-threatening disease.
By 2005, Dylan’s condition worsened significantly. He was often confined to a wheelchair and needed oxygen for breathlessness. He joined the transplant list to obtain a new heart and four weeks later a donor heart became available.
Dylan’s recovery from the gruelling operation was remarkable. Just 18 months after the transplant he was back at school. Great Ormond Street Hospital has organised for him to have a carer at school to help him catch up with his peers and he is going from strength to strength. A grateful Michelle says of the Great Ormond Street Hospital staff who took care of Dylan: “They are fantastic, you couldn’t fault them.”
