Baby boy needs 'urgent' heart op

Baby's parents in organ plea

The parents of a five-month-old boy with a rare heart condition have been told he "urgently" needs a transplant to survive.

Ted Parks, of Middlesbrough, has arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathy, a heart muscle disease.

He is being kept alive at Newcastle's Freeman Hospital by a Berlin-heart machine.

But doctors have told his parents Kay Husband and Stephen Parks he risks a stroke unless a donor is found.

The couple, of the Normanby area, are now appealing for parents to join the NHS organ donor register.

Infection risk

Ms Husband said: "I just think that if people could see what we have seen, not just Ted but other children who are in places like the Freeman, you would think: 'Well why would I not sign up to organ donation?'"

Cardiologist Dr Richard Kirk said: "[On the Berlin-heart machine] there is a risk of him having a stroke, a risk of bleeding and the risk of infection.

"Really it is very urgent that we get a transplant for him so we can take him off the Berlin-heart and minimise all those risks for him."

Doctors detected irregularities with Ted's heartbeat after his birth at James Cook University Hospital in Middlesbrough in June.

He was allowed home after being sent to the Freeman Hospital for monitoring but his condition worsened in October and he was then fitted with the Berlin-heart after being airlifted to Tyneside.