A toddler who who has spent almost half of her life in hospital has now received a new heart.
For the last 14 months, little Beatrix Adamson-Archbold has been waiting at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle for a heart transplant.
The two-year-old fell ill with heart failure in May last year and has been kept alive by a Berlin Heart. The machine pumped blood around her body and kept her heart functioning until she received a new one.
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Last month, her parents Terry Archbold, 45, and Cheryl Adamson, 40, from Burnopfield, County Durham, received the call to say a heart was now available.
The couple waited anxiously at the hospital in High Heaton as Beatrix, who they call Bea, underwent surgery for nine hours. Beatrix is now on the road to recovery and they hope she may be able to finally return home.
Terry, who works as a sergeant for Durham Constabulary, has described the last few weeks as a "complete whirlwind".
He said: "It's just been an absolute blur because things happened really quickly. It's hard because you know what that call means. You know that somebody else, at that moment in time, is saying goodbye so it's difficult. It's very bitter sweet.
"Time just stops when you're waiting for the call to say how it's gone. When she came out of surgery I felt relieved, thankful and extremely lucky.
"It might have been the last time we saw her when we took her upstairs to the surgical theatre and handed her over. There's nothing bigger that you can do to a human being and it comes with a huge amount of risk.
"Organ donation for children as small and young as Bea is extremely rare. She's been given her life back and she's been given a future and that is absolutely amazing.
"It's all just very surreal because it's been such a long time. The prospect that we're going to be able to take her home is strange.
"It could be in another couple of weeks if progress keeping going as it is. She's recovering well and they are happy with her progress."
Terry and Cheryl previously lost their daughter Isabel when she was stillborn in 2018. They made the difficult decision to donate her organs to help children who were in need of a transplant.
In a cruel twist of fate, the couple found themselves waiting for a heart to be donated to Beatrix. They have spent the last 14 months sharing her journey and raising awareness of organ donation.
Terry and Cheryl first became concerned about then-15-month-old Beatrix when she lost her appetite and became lethargic in May 2022. They thought she may have contracted Covid-19 as they had just returned from Disney World in Florida and Cheryl and her daughter Eliza, 12, had both tested positive for the virus.
When a small rash appeared on the back of Beatrix's neck, she was rushed in an ambulance to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead to be checked out. Chest x-rays revealed that one side of her heart was enlarged and not functioning properly.
Beatrix was then transferred to the Freeman Hospital where she had a Hickman Line inserted so she could receive medication. During the procedure, she had a cardiac arrest and medics had to fight to bring her back.
Terry and Cheryl were then given the devastating news that Beatrix needed a heart transplant and underwent surgery to attach her to a Berlin Heart. During her time on the ward, she has battled back from a serious blood clot as well as an infection.
Terry said: "The staff here are her family. You can see that they all care massively about her. They have watched her grow up. They have spent just as much time with her as we have.
"The care they have shown to Bea and all the other children and their families is absolutely fantastic."
In May 2020, the Government changed the law so that, under Max and Keira’s Law, people now need to opt out if they do not want to be an organ donor. However a person's next of kin has the opportunity to choose not to provide consent for organ donation to take place.
Terry said: "We're going to keep on telling Bea's story and raising awareness.
"Ultimately organ donation is about life and gifting life. Would you accept a donated organ to save your little one and would you give that same gift of life to help other children like Bea?"
