A wonderful story about a very good man -- and a big failure of socialized medicine

Only the extraordinary personal efforts of a dedicated doctor saved the life of a baby

A newborn baby was saved from kidney failure after a paediatrician built a dialysis machine for her in his garage. Millie Kelly was given little chance of surviving her first weeks when she suffered kidney failure after a lifesaving operation. At 6lb 2oz (3.3kg), she was too small to use the NHS dialysis machine that would do the work of her failed kidneys. It was not until Malcolm Coulthard, a paediatrician at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle, built the machine that she began to recover. Millie is now a fit two-year-old and her mother is supporting Dr Coulthard's campaign for hospitals across the country to have dialysis machines for small babies.

Rebecca Kelly, a 21-year-old student, admitted to misgivings the first time she saw the machine that represented her child's last chance of survival. "It looked handmade in the garage," she said. "It did not look like it was a professional NHS thing. He had made it out of metal and there were a few paint splodges on it. "I did not know what to think really, but I knew it was the only hope. It was touch and go and I went along with it."

Despite its rough-and-ready appearance, it was the product of hours of painstaking work by Dr Coulthard. Millie was attached to the machine for seven days before she began to show signs of recovery. She had suffered kidney failure after an emergency operation for gastroschisis, a condition that causes the intestines to protrude from an opening near the umbilical cord.

Ms Kelly, from Middlesbrough, was convinced that her daughter would survive. "When she was ill, I knew she wouldn't give in. I was devastated when they said she wouldn't make it, but she's a fighter and I knew she would pull through," she said. "If it was not for that machine then she would not be here today. Words cannot describe how grateful my family are to Dr Coulthard. Not only is he a great consultant but now also a great friend and inspiration to Millie, my family and I. "Afterwards, the doctors and nurses didn't know if she would make a full recovery, but she's just turned 2 and she's a normal, happy baby now."

Ms Kelly is calling for more funding to build new machines, as the baby dialysis machine in Newcastle is the only one in the country. "It saved my daughter's life and other babies should have the same chance," she said.

Dr Coulthard, who designed the machine with Jean Crosier, the senior children's kidney nurse, also hopes to build on the success. "This machine is only being used on the tiniest, earliest babies where there is nothing else that can be done," he said. "But if we had a machine that we could use much more freely, then we would be able to deal with many more babies and have a much greater chance of saving lives." The machine allows haemodialysis, the process that cleans the blood through an artificial kidney, to be carried out on babies with renal failure. Underweight newborn babies usually cannot undergo the treatment.

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