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(London) Hannah Clark is a 16-year-old with a shy laugh and a love of animals. She likes to go shopping with friends and dreams of a career working with children.
But Hannah Clark is no ordinary teenager and her normal life today could not have been possible without a unique, life-changing heart surgery.

In 1994 when she was eight-months-old, Hannah was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy -- an inflammation of the heart muscle that impairs the heart's ability to work properly.

Hannah's heart was failing and she needed a transplant. But instead of taking her own heart out, doctors added a new donated heart to her own when she was just two-years-old.

The so-called "piggyback" operation allowed the donor heart to do the work while Hannah's heart rested.

But Hannah was not in the clear yet. As with any organ transplant, Hannah's body was likely to reject her new heart and she had to take powerful immune suppression drugs.

Those drugs allowed her body to accept the donor heart but also led to lung cancer and yet another medical battle for Hannah that lasted for years.

Nearly 11 years after receiving the extra heart, there was more bad news: The immuno-suppression drugs were no longer working. Hannah's body was rejecting the donor heart.
But Hannah was not in the clear yet. As with any organ transplant, Hannah's body was likely to reject her new heart and she had to take powerful immune suppression drugs.

Those drugs allowed her body to accept the donor heart but also led to lung cancer and yet another medical battle for Hannah that lasted for years.

In February 2006, her doctors tried something that had never been done before: They took out the donor heart. Doctors theorized that the donor heart had allowed Hannah's heart to rest, recover and grow back stronger.

Now for the first time Hannah's father, Paul Clark, describes the agonizing decision the family had to make at the time: "If she'd never had it done, she wouldn't be here.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/07/14...art/index.html

[Hotstuff]

wow

[annmarie]

loved the post goes to show even the impossible can be achieved
if we keep trying and never give up