Aaron adapts to hospital life on heart transplant wait list (From The Northern Echo)

Aaron adapts to hospital life on heart transplant wait list

5:00am Thursday 4th February 2010 in

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A HUNDRED days after being admitted to hospital, threeyear- old Aaron Vincent is still desperately waiting for a new heart.

Just before Christmas, The Northern Echo exclusively revealed how the Wearside youngster was being kept alive by a mechanical pump connected to his chest.

His heart is so badly damaged by a virus that he urgently needs a transplant.

Since he was fitted with a life-saving Berlin Heart artificial pump, he has been living on a hospital ward waiting for the call.

Hopes Aaron, from Houghton-le-Spring, might get a new heart at Christmas were dashed, but his plight was reported nationwide.

A hundred days since he was admitted to hospital, Aaron’s mother, Andrea Middlemass, told how her son was coping.

She said: “It is very disappointing that he has not been offered a new heart, but he is doing really well.

Ms Middlemass, 34, said By Barry Nelson Health Editor newsdesk@nne.co.uk doctors at the Freeman Hospital’s specialist transplant unit in Newcastle have said her son was stable and doing well on the Berlin Heart device.

She said: “He might be connected to an artificial heart pump, but he is just a typical three-year-old, dashing around and throwing regular paddies.”

Despite being encumbered by the Berlin Heart, which has two pumping chambers and is connected to his own heart by two transparent tubes, he still manages to play with other children.

Ms Middlemass said: “It has not stopped him playing football or hide and seek with the nurses. He gets the nurses to make him little dens as well.”

A teacher who works in the hospital also helps Aaron to pass the time constructively while regular visits from family and friends help to keep his spirits up.

Aaron was born healthy, but later admitted to Sunderland Royal Hospital suffering from an unknown illness.

At first doctors thought it was a bad asthma attack, but scans discovered he had pneumonia, a collapsed lung and an enlarged heart.

Doctors transferred him to the specialist heart unit at the Freeman, where he was placed on the transplant list.

Ms Middlemass said: “We are just waiting and hoping.

We do not know when we will get the call. That is the million dollar question.”