Oliva Norton, now six months, was born completely white because she had such a low count of haemoglobin, the chemical which carries oxygen in red blood cells, that it could not officially be classed as ‘blood’.
She was given less than two hours to live but survived thanks to emergency transfusions which transformed her into a glowing healthy pink colour.
Mother Louise Bearman, 31, told of her shock at giving birth to a “ghost white” baby whose condition was so rare she will now feature in medical text books.
She said: “Olivia was my first so I didn’t know what to expect – but I certainly didn’t think she’d be that colour.
“I’ll never forget what the doctors notes said – ‘white and floppy’. When Olivia came out so white we didn’t know what was going on.”
“It was such a relief when the doctor’s explained what was happening, and it was quite amazing when they put the blood in her and she slowly turned this amazing pink colour.”
Louise and her partner Paul Norton, 36, of Witham, Essex, first noticed something was wrong when they didn’t feel Olivia kicking for three days.
At Broomfield Hospital, in Chelmsford, nurses ordered an emergency caesarean and Olivia was born six weeks early weighing 5lbs 3oz with her heartbeat dipping dangerously low. “I want mums to realise how important a baby’s movement is in checking they are healthy. You have to trust your maternal instinct.”
Source: www.telegraph.co.uk.
