Surgery for Grayson

At Grayson’s 20 week scan we learnt that he has a serious heart defect; Tetralogy of fallot with absent pulmonary disease. Basically Grayson’s heart is not strong enough as it has a hole in it, the aorta is in the wrong place and the most serious part is that two of his valves do not work. Everything else in Grayson’s wee body is perfectly developed. His outlook was grim as we were told that he would not survive. Specialists in Dunedin, Christchurch and Auckland regularly checked Grayson while in utero, they all told us that we would not bring our baby home.

On the 8th September Grayson was born, from then on he has been a fighter and defied all the odds. When he was 3 days old Grayson came home to ‘enjoy family time’. Grayson was not expected to survive so surgery was not originally an option. Despite Grayson’s severe heart defect he has gained weight and has developed like any other newborn. This has lead Grayson’s family to seek more help with his diagnosis, there is a hospital in Melbourne called The Royal Children’s Hospital who are willing to operate on Grayson to attempt to repair the valves in his heart. We are still in the process of working out how it would take place but at this stage there are two options, once doctors have confirmed Grayson’s treatment plan we will update this page: