Aura Sabadus A baby girl is fighting another battle for survival after undergoing a third serious heart operation within a year.Tiana Mackay, a ten-month old from Toftwood, was born with two heart defects, including a very rare illness, which meant she needed immediate surgery.

Aura Sabadus

A baby girl is fighting another battle for survival after undergoing a third serious heart operation within a year.

Tiana Mackay, a ten-month old from Toftwood, was born with two heart defects, including a very rare illness, which meant she needed immediate surgery at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London

Her first operation took place at the beginning of March, but her health deteriorated and she needed a second a few weeks later.

Her condition improved considerably immediately afterwards - but two weeks ago, just the day after her 35-year-old father Kevin Mackay did a parachute jump to raise money for the Great Ormond Street Hospital, Tiana became ill again.

On Tuesday she underwent a six-hour operation at the same hospital where surgeons replaced a valve, following an infection.

Mother Lisa King said the next 36 hours would be critical. “She's a little fighter. She's proved she can make it, we're just hopeful she'll pull it through again. When she came out of the operating theatre she had a lot of bleeding from the chest. She was coming round very quickly and the doctors had to keep her sedated.

“I was told the doctors had to replace the valve, it was so damaged they couldn't fix it. Doctors also did a brain scan at the beginning of the week because they were concerned that the infection may have spread to other parts of the body.”

Mrs King said just before doctors were preparing Tiana to travel to Great Ormond Street Hospital from Norfolk & Norwich University Hospital where she had been admitted, she went into cardiac arrest for two minutes but was resuscitated and stabilised.

“Doctors have told us Tiana will require further operations to replace the valve as she gets older. They estimate as a child this will happen every one to three years then every 15-20 years as an adult. We're hopeful she will make it once again. It may be a slow recovery this time, because she hadn't been feeding well before the illness. But we're confident she will fight and make it through yet again.”

Lisa said Tiana was born with two heart defects a very rare one called Alcapa meaning the coronary artery was in the wrong place and mitral regurgitation in which the heart's mitral valve does not close tightly, stopping the blood from flowing efficiently through the heart and the body.

“Back in March, one of the doctors told us that her condition was so rare that he hadn't seen a similar case in his 25 years as a surgeon,” Lisa added.