Heart patient Sigourney's transplant wait - in a hospital 50 miles from home

Work pals buy her iPad and Lego sets to help pass time as she waits for a donor

- Thomas Cooper

A HEART patient will have to remain in hospital 50 miles from home as she waits for an urgent transplant.

Sigourney Ley is on an 'urgent' list for a full heart transplant as her organ works at only 50 per cent capacity.

The 38-year-old, of Fenton, will go under the knife at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, as soon as a suitable heart becomes available.

She has been on the list since November 2 and will remain on the transplant ward indefinitely.

The Mr Kipling factory worker has struggled with cardiac issues all her life, after defects were discovered at birth. But her condition worsened in 2017 after doctors at the Royal Stoke University Hospital told her she was suffering with heart failure.

She said: "When I was born, they discovered I had two holes in my heart. I had to have lifesaving surgery to repair it when I was just six weeks old. I caught meningitis as a result of that procedure. It must have been a scary time for my parents. But I recovered okay from everything.

"Then I got diagnosed with heart failure when I was 32. I started after I went to the doctors because I kept getting heart palpitations and getting out of breath really easily.

"Just walking places or going up steps was exhausting. I knew something wasn't right.