 device. It was the first time the Children's Air Ambulance had used it for such a transfer with the specialist team on board. They took Lola from Birmingham, where she was being treated, to Newcastle's Freeman Hospital. Lola, then 18 months old, was described as being hours from death. She caught a cold and a virus began attacking her heart. She went into heart failure and the tot, from Stone, near Stoke-on-Trent, relied on the ECMO machine to keep her alive. She was the first to use the machine on board the specialist Children's Air Ambulance. And the little miracle then received a new heart from Europe thanks to a new 'Heartbox', a device which is set to revolutionise transplants in the UK. The Freeman, where Mirror campaigner Max Johnson received his new heart, is leading a trial of the new kit, one of 15 centres across Europe. Surgeons believe it could mean donor hearts are viable for transplant for 12-24 hours instead of the current 3-4 hours. The new box uses oxygenated blood to keep them stable and crucially, they are kept on ice and no longer need to be beating. That extends the time they are ready for transplant, paving the way for donor organs to be flown from hundreds of miles away. Lola, now 23 months old, became best friends with Bea Adamson-Archbold as she waited for her op at the Freeman. The Mirror told how Terry and Cheryl Archbold suffered the agony of then 16-month-old Beatrix's cardiac arrest after she was rushed to hospital. In 2018 they lost their own daughter Isabelle when she was stillborn and agreed to donate her organs for research. Beatrix has al){kind=link}
The then 18-month-old girl was first to use the device on board a children’s air ambulance after she suffered heart failure and was flown almost 180 miles to save her life
A little girl made history as she was flown to hospital on a machine which kept her alive before a heart transplant.
Lola Plimmer was so poorly that she had to be transported using the Extra Corporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO) device.
It was the first time the Children’s Air Ambulance had used it for such a transfer with the specialist team on board.
They took Lola from Birmingham, where she was being treated, to Newcastle’s Freeman Hospital.