Running around the playground, her blonde curls moving, it’s hard to believe that three-year-old Molly Young has been sick at least one day in her life. But just a few weeks after his birth, he was on the verge of death.
Born two months early and underweight in September 2021, she contracted a virus shortly after arriving home and when her parents realized she was having difficulty breathing, they rushed her to hospital in an ambulance.
Doctors diagnosed him with pneumonia and, even more worrying, life-threatening sepsis, which occurs when the body overreacts to an infection and damages tissues and organs.
Scans revealed his lungs were swollen and filled with fluid, meaning he was at risk of suffocation. They hooked her up to a ventilator, but this had little effect.
Molly with her mother Rose after completing a run for Evelina London Children’s Charity
Baby Molly in the hospital fighting sepsis and pneumonia
Molly cheers on her mom and waves a flag in support of ELCH
In critical condition, she was transferred to the specialist Evelina London Children’s Hospital, where doctors proposed a radical intervention.
Molly’s parents, Rose Abbott and Sam Young, from Walthamstow, east London, were told she would need a procedure called extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), which allows the body to breathe without using the lungs.
It involves removing blood from the body, removing the carbon dioxide and adding fresh oxygen and then returning it to the body.
This ensures that the organs continue to function. However, while effective in adults, the procedure is risky for children as it can cause strokes and other complications.
The chances of this happening are greater in newborns, because their blood vessels are small and easily damaged.
But Evelina Hospital has pioneered a new approach to ECMO for children.
Normally, in children, blood is removed and returned through the neck. However, experts say this increases the risk of blood clots traveling to the brain and causing strokes. Instead, Evelina’s specialists proposed returning oxygenated blood through the leg.
With no other options, Rose and Sam gave their consent, but feared that Molly would never wake up.
“We were devastated,” says Rose, 39, a brand manager for a cosmetics company. “I knew that if this didn’t work, we would lose her, because it was the only option left.”
Molly was on ECMO for 12 days, giving doctors enough time to give her antibiotics and powerful steroids to fight the lung infection and control the sepsis. And although Molly’s leg swelled as a result of the catheter placed in her groin, she did not suffer any dangerous side effects.
Her condition improved quickly, and after being on a ventilator for two more days, she was breathing freely. She was discharged after three months.
“Molly was incredibly sick and we needed to give her lungs a rest and a chance to heal,” explains Dr Jon Lillie, Evelina’s consultant in pediatric intensive care.
“She was the sickest patient in the hospital before we put her on ECMO, but she got better very quickly afterwards.”
Evelina now teaches her technique at other children’s hospitals.
Every year in England, around 50,000 children are admitted to hospital with pneumonia, and around 1,000 die. About 25,000 children are diagnosed with sepsis.
“This method is starting to be used more and more in young children,” says Dr. Lillie. “While all forms of ECMO carry risks, since starting this new approach we have not seen any strokes.”
Rose and Sam, who also have a five-year-old son, Hughie, say Molly’s recovery is remarkable.
“The first time we hugged her again was amazing,” Rose says. ‘When you have a baby you take it for granted that you can hold them, but I didn’t hold her for over a month because of all the wires and tubes.
“Holding her for about an hour every day, that meant a lot.”
Molly is full of energy now, Rose says. “We feel that a miracle has been performed for us,” he adds. ‘Molly is just lovely, so much fun, she runs everywhere and can’t wait to be outside. “She has this absolute fire inside her, this incredible spirit.”
