“Romy owes her life to unknown heroes who chose to support an important cause – people who, like her, have their hearts in the right place: on the side of life.”
The second pregnancy ultrasound is a moment that all parents-to-be look forward to: it’s the chance to find out the sex of the baby! In the case of Julie and Fanny’s child, a couple living in the Montérégie region, this matter was quickly settled: they will have a little girl. But that’s not all the ultrasound reveals. The baby who was to become little Romy appeared to have a heart defect. A few weeks later, at the CHU de Ste-Justine, the diagnosis was confirmed: Romy was suffering from dextrocardia, a very rare malformation which means that her heart, rather than being lodged on the left side of her chest, is instead on the right.
Julie is in her 19th week of pregnancy, and the specialists’ verdict is as clear-cut as it is damning: Romy’s chances of survival are practically nil, and it might be better to terminate the pregnancy immediately rather than give birth to a baby who will only survive a few minutes… But at the next appointment, a minor miracle seems to have taken place, much to the surprise of the medical team. Romy’s heart is indeed slightly deviated to the right, but in the end she has the same viability as an ordinary baby.
Nothing more normal than to be nervous in this situation,” reassures her partner Fanny. No, it’s not: in her belly, Romy is not moving. The day progresses, but the situation does not improve. Julie went to her local hospital. After a few tests, she was told that Romy had to be taken out of the womb by Caesarean section.
On the operating table, Julie can hardly see the white body that has just been removed from her belly. Romy doesn’t cry. A nurse is busy working on the little body; Julie understands that she is intubating it. A voice repeats: “We’re going to lose her, we’re going to lose her”. She would later learn that, for reasons as yet unknown – perhaps unrelated to the location of her heart – Romy had lost over 70% of her blood in her belly. There was almost no life left in the little body, which was whisked away in the ambulance to Montreal’s CHU Ste-Justine. Just before leaving, Romy received her first blood transfusion.
For many hours, her mothers had no news of her. It was only later that they learned that on her arrival at Ste-Justine’s, Romy had no tonus, and that at that point, the medical team had decided that if Romy had enough blood left in her body to survive, it was almost inevitable that she would have significant cognitive after-effects. But she was still alive, and a second blood transfusion was given.
“I had never given blood, nor had my partner. Since Romy was born in May 2022, we’ve organized 3 blood drives, we’ve made donations, I’ve created an Instagram account to tell as many people as possible. Because it’s thanks to this blood donation, to everyone who revolves around Héma-Québec and its Foundation, that my child is alive. It’s not an operation or a transplant that would have saved his life, it’s the blood.”
When she was finally able to speak to the doctors responsible for her daughter, who was only a few hours old, Julie received some unexpected news: since the second transfusion, Romy had regained her tone, she was sucking her pacifier, she had been drinking. At first glance, there was no reason to suspect any cognitive sequelae. She was fine.
Romy spends six days in the neonatal department. Her parents receive confirmation that her heart is still on the right, but that this anomaly seems to have no impact on her health.
Romy owes her life to unknown heroes who have chosen to support an important cause – people who, like her, have their hearts in the right place: on the side of life.
By making a financial contribution to the Héma-Québec Foundation, you strengthen the human chain that supports Héma-Québec’s noble mission of giving the gift of life to the next generation of recipients and their families.
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