'Super Ted' keeps his battle for life going

Nov 23 2009 by Rob Pattinson, The Journal

A BABY is bravely clinging on to life despite his heart stopping beating three times. Nurses at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle have nicknamed five-month-old Ted Parks "Super Ted" because of the resilience he has shown in his short life.

Ted, from Middlesbrough, has a variation of the heart condition arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathy which has never been seen before, according to his doctor, consultant paediatric cardiologist Richard Kirk.

He needs a heart transplant to survive and is being kept alive on a Berlin Heart machine, which pumps blood around his body.

Ted was admitted to the Freeman Hospital for treatment twice in the weeks after his birth, in June, but his battle for survival began six weeks ago when he was happily playing with his brother Tom.

His mother Kay Husband said: “He started to whimper, so I picked him up. He turned this horrible pink colour so I shouted for Stephen’s sister to get an ambulance. There was no movement or sound from him. I couldn’t tell if he was breathing.

“It was terrifying. I thought he was going to die in front of me and there was nothing I could do.

“I just kept rubbing him and saying ‘come on Ted’ then he just let out this long horrible groan. His eyes were rolling, then he just went limp.”

Ted was so poorly that he was transferred by air ambulance from Teesside’s James Cook Hospital to the Freeman.

Kay and Ted’s father Stephen Parks were taken to the hospital by police who held up rush hour traffic at the Tyne Tunnel to clear the way. At the Freeman, Ted was placed on a life-support machine.

After 10 days when his condition appeared to be stable, Ted’s heart stopped a third time but the youngster astonished medics by pulling through.

Kay said: “He might need a heart transplant, but to us he’s got the heart of a lion."

It was four weeks before Kay and Stephen could hold their son again. Even then they were frightened of hurting him. This week, for the first time since the start of their ordeal, Ted smiled.

Stephen said: “It’s just heart breaking, just amazing. It was like having the old Ted back.”

He will not leave the hospital until he has a new heart. Doctors say that they have been unable to find another instance of the illness anywhere else in the world.