A baby girl has a new chance at life after she was given open heart surgery – just minutes after being born.
 
Chanel Murrish developed a rare heart condition in the womb, and doctors said she was unlikely to survive.
 
Chanel was delivered by caesarean at Newcastle’s Freeman Hospital and moments after she was born, surgeons operated on the 7lb baby, placing a stent in her heart - making her the youngest person in Britain to ever have open heart surgery.
 
Chanel then had another operation for a condition called hypoplastic left heart syndrome, which meant only one half of her heart was beating.
 
Now, at five weeks old, Chanel is going from strength to strength and her mum Fay said she’s so proud of her little girl.
 
Fay, 24, said, “Chanel has proved she is determined to live. I’m so proud of her. The doctors say one in three million babies are at risk of the same condition.”
 
“Before she was born the specialists said she might not survive birth but we couldn’t face a termination,” said the mum. “I know she wanted to live because she was giving a huge thumbs-up at her scan. It was like she was telling us everything would be OK.”
 
Fay had a straightforward pregnancy until her 20-week scan during which she was told of her baby’s condition.
 
Later in the pregnancy, Fay and her partner Micheal from County Durham in the UK, were faced with the agonising decision of whether to terminate the pregnancy because doctors also found problems with her heart’s blood flow.
 
Fay said, “The options were putting Chanel through the operations with a 20 per cent chance of survival, a termination or I could give birth to her and let her slip away peacefully.”
 
But they decided to go ahead with the pregnancy and not only did little Chanel survive her first surgery, she then pulled through a seven-hour operation just seven days later.
 
Only then were the couple’s sons, Chase, four, and Cole, 22 months, able to meet their sister for the first time.
 
Fay said, “For now we’re living in the moment and enjoying our beautiful baby daughter.”
 

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