‘Miracle’ survival of young Brixton mum and baby after string of health scares

By Rachael Burford, Local Democracy Reporter

A young mother has told of her “miracle” survival after a heart transplant and cancer – while her baby son’s life was saved by being given a new liver.

Alexe Deane, 25, from Brixton, said she and son Khari, now three, overcame “impossible odds” to be recovering well, as she thanked the “incredible” doctors and nurses who helped save them.

Ms Deane’s ordeal began in 2016, when she began feeling ill shortly after learning she was pregnant while she was studying to be a paediatric nurse at the University of Greenwich.

She said: “I was light-headed and finding it really hard working on the ward and had to start studying at home.

“When I went into labour I wasn’t dilating enough. My heart rate was too high and the baby’s was low so they rushed me in for an emergency Caesarean section. I couldn’t lie down flat, I was choking and in heart failure.”

Khari was delivered safely but jaundiced. Ms Deane was told she had a previously undiagnosed heart condition and needed a transplant. She spent four months on the donor list before getting a new organ.

Although the transplant was successful, Ms Deane later began suffering excruciating headaches.

At the same time her son’s health started to deteriorate. He was still jaundiced and vomiting blood. Doctors removed his gallbladder but told Ms Deane and her partner Keelan that Khari would need a liver transplant. Then Ms Deane found a lump on her neck.

A biopsy revealed she had PTLD (post-transplant lymphoproliferative disease) – a rare aggressive form of lymphoma sometimes developed by transplant patients.

She started chemotherapy in March 2018, a few months before her son, then aged one, underwent his liver transplant at King’s College Hospital.

He said: “It was numbing really. I was in total shock. I’d gone through a hard birth, a heart transplant, my son’s operation and learning he needed a transplant, and now I was facing eight rounds of chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

“I was feeling pretty useless. There were times when Khari was almost looking after me and saying ‘Don’t worry, mummy’.

“Keelan was basically a single parent. They are both amazing but it was heart-breaking at times. But I knew I had to cope and keep going for Khari.”

Both Ms Deane and her son completed their treatments and have recovered well.
“My doctor told me I could write a book about what happened to me,” said Ms Deane. “The odds were impossible. It’s a miracle really, that we got through everything.”

Ms Deane has now enrolled on a public health course and is campaigning for Cancer Research UK for donations to get life-saving research back on track during the Covid-19 crisis.

She said: “We have been shielding during the pandemic but it has been nice in a way. I feel like I missed out on being a mum at the start of Khari’s life, so the whole world slowing down has meant I’ve been able to catch up on things.

“But charities have lost out a lot because of Covid. But I’m only here today because of research and medical advancements.

“It’s so hard to think of research being delayed and what this might mean for people in the future.”

Pictured top: Alexe Deane with son Khari