A Scottish mum who received a heart transplant has told how her six-year-old daughter saved her life twice using a smart speaker.
Emma Anderson, from Robroyston in Glasgow, was 15 when she was diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.
From a young age, her daughter Darcey knew her mum had a “sore heart” and she could call for help on Alexa.
Now Darcey has used Alexa twice to raise the alarm when her 27-year-old mum has been unwell.
“I set up the Alexa so that if I passed out or was feeling unwell all she had to do was say, ‘Alexa, call help’, and that would call my mum who lives around the corner,” Ms Anderson said.
“And she’s had to call on Alexa a couple of times, she even called an ambulance on her own and that time I was in a really bad way.
“I’m so proud of her, she is a wee superstar.”
Ms Anderson’s explained her health condition to BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme.
“Basically it means that the muscle surrounding the heart starts to grow too thick,” she said.
“The way I was kind of described it was instead of beating against a cushion, it’s like every beat the heart is beating against a brick wall so it’s getting more and more damaged each time.”
Mostly managed by medication through her life, she was told at a routine check-up that she needed a life-saving heart transplant urgently.
“I went in for my routine check up and was told that it had gotten really bad and I couldn’t wait on the routine list at home anymore, I had to come in and be put on an urgent list because basically if I left the hospital I didn’t have much time left,” she said.
“I went into hospital and a few months in my heart completely failed.
“I ended up on an aortic balloon pump which kept my heart beating for me until we could hopefully get a transplant.
“And then it was about 10 days after going on that, we got a call saying a donor heart was available.”
Emma received the transplant in April, 2022 at the NHS Golden Jubilee hospital in Clydebank.
When first diagnosed, she had an internal defibrillator implanted inside her chest, which “fired” three times last year.
She said the heart transplant had been transformative and she was able to marry her partner Conner last July.
Ms Anderson said: “Since my transplant I have a totally new life now.
“I can actually walk to school and pick Darcey up and walk back again, something I could never do before.
“Over Easter, I managed to take Darcey swimming and to the play park, the farm park, simple things I wasn’t able to do before, I can do now. I’m able to be a mummy now.”
About 28,000 Scots have an inherited heart condition, the most common being hypertrophic cardiomyopathy according to the British Journal of Cardiology.
Ms Anderson said she was eternally grateful to her donor and their family for what they have done for her.
“Getting a transplant is a very hard road, it’s not easy,” she said.
“I was on life support and all sorts of other treatments after my operation for a long while, and my muscles deteriorated so much I couldn’t walk any more.
“The only thing I seemed to care about once I was better was learning to walk again so I could walk down that aisle and get married.
“I was literally discharged just over a week before the wedding, I still had stitches in walking down the aisle.”
While recovering in hospital, Ms Anderson created a TikTok video with images of different stages of her heart journey using Scots singing star Tom Walker’s song, The Best Is Yet To Come.
The singer was so touched by the video he invited her to London to appear in a video featuring people who had inspired him.
She said: “Tom contacted me and asked me to go down to London and be part of his music video to raise awareness.
“So I went down and did that with other people who were absolutely incredible, who had been through a lot in life too, and it was so nice of Tom to recognise that through his inspiring music.
“Like the lyrics say, I definitely think the best is yet to come for me thanks to my organ donor.
“It’s a horrible situation to be in but…I’m eternally grateful. There are no words I could put into…what that donor family has done for me and my family and my child.”
Chief executive of NHS Golden Jubilee, Gordon James, said: “As we celebrate 75 years of the NHS, Emma’s inspiring story shows us how valuable and crucial the life-saving care the NHS provides is to our patients.”
Source – BBC News
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