A TINY baby became the youngest person to have open heart surgery when Newcastle doctors operated on her just 17 hours after her birth.

Jasmine Carr was given only a 15% chance of survival by surgeons at the Freeman Hospital when she was born with one side of her heart malformed.

But she made it through the 11-hour operation and is now out of intensive care.

Now her parents, Jo and James, hope she will be able to join them in their County Durham home by April.

They were told their baby would suffer from hypoplastic left heart syndrome after Jo’s 20-week scan.

Doctors were so concerned that they even gave the parents the opportunity to terminate the pregnancy or watch Jasmine die in their arms.

But the parents opted instead for a risky immediate operation.

Jo, 27, a hospital cook from Newton Aycliffe, said: “It was a no-brainer – we had to go for the operation.

“Doctors only gave her a 15% chance and it could have been the last time we saw her.

“Waiting for the surgeons to complete the operation was the most distressing few hours of my life.”

Jo was induced at 37 weeks, giving birth to a baby girl who weighed just 51b 13oz – with a heart the size of a walnut.