SIGHTS SET ON LIVING
Siblings aim for Games medals
Teenager Rachael Moffat doesn’t need to finish in the medal positions for confirmation that she’s a winner.
The 18-year-old from Cleland has already beaten the odds — not once but twice.
Rachael was diagnosed with restrictive cardiomyopathy at the age of seven and has had two heart transplants.
Incredibly on the same day she was diagnosed, her brother Stephen, 22, and dad Andy were also told they had the rare heart condition.
The siblings underwent heart transplants within nine months of each other at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle — Stephen in November 2007 and Rachael in August 2008.
Seven years later Rachael had to have a second heart transplant after becoming unwell again.
The former Coltness High pupils will represent Team GB at the World Transplant Games, which ironically are being held in Newcastle and Gateshead.
Rachael will be looking to shoot down the opposition in the archery event, while Stephen will be hoping to strike gold in tenpin bowling.
Their mum Mary, 54, a former midwife said: “We applied for the games and laughed when we found out it was Newcastle. We’ve just spent half of our lives there.
“Stephen is really competitive and wants to go and win, he has always been that way. He still plays football but gets really tired afterwards.
“I don’t think he has went to any games and not came back with a medal.”
For Rachael just taking part in the games confirms her as a winner.
Mary continued: “There were no obvious signs that anything was the matter with Rachael at first.
“She never liked to walk but that was probably because she knew her own limitations.
“She started school and was falling asleep all the time in abnormal positions and I thought ‘that’s not normal’.”
Mary, who is also mum to Christopher, 34, and has a four-yearold grandson AJ (Andrew Jack), sought medical help after sharing her concerns with her mother-in-law.
She discovered husband Andy had a blocked aorta as a child and displayed the same symptoms.
Stephen had collapsed when he was nine but hospital staff passed it off as asthma. He was referred to Yorkhill after collapsing again.
The siblings were seen on the same day by the same consultant and an echocardiogram showed up a problem with Rachael’s heart.
“They took us into a room and told us Stephen had Long QT syndrome and Rachael’s heart was totally abnormal,” said Mary.
Both Mary and Andy had ECGS to find out if the problem was genetic.
A couple of days later dad Andy, Rachael and Stephen were all given the devastating diagnosis they had restrictive cardiomyopathy. All three would need transplant surgery.
The family were left heartbroken in 2010 when Andy died during his heart transplant at the Golden Jubilee Hospital in Clydebank.
In 2015 Rachael became seriously ill again and in the presence of specialist consultants at Freeman Hospital went into cardiac arrest. It was touch and go if she would make it through.
Rachael was readied to be put on a Berlin Heart — a machine that acts as a mechanical heart for patients at end stage heart failure — when a donor heart became available.
The family will be forever grateful to the donors and their families for the gift of life they’ve been given.
“They said they thought it would be almost impossible to find another donor,” Mary admitted.
“I just thought what a miracle, again. We’ve had so many miracles.
“Without that donor she wouldn’t be here. We just didn’t think that would be possible. She’s had a very long journey back but she’s made it.”
Mary welcomed the recent opt-out change to the organ donor system.
“When your children are really ill then it’s difficult to think of anything else”, she admits.
“You don’t know what’s going to happen in life. If something happened to one of your family members would you accept an organ?
“If the answer is yes then why would you hesitate to donate your organs?”
The World Transplant Games take place from August 17 to 24. More information can be found at wtgf.org