BATTLING two-year-old Harrison Johnson (From Western Telegraph)

BATTLING two-year-old Harrison Johnson

BATTLING two-year-old Harrison Johnson has fought major illness for all of his short life - now his family are bracing themselves for his next date with the surgeon's knife.

The Newport youngster has survived triple bypass heart surgery at just seven months old, followed by two strokes, brain damage, partial paralysis, and liver, kidney, gut and bowel problems

Now he faces another vital heart operation at Birmingham Children's Hospital to try to correct a narrowing in a key artery which causes him to get breathless and go blue.

The defect is one of four that co-exist in a condition known as Tetralogy of Fallot, which occurs in around one in 1,000 babies and requires major corrective surgery very early in life.

Harrison spent six months in hospital after his triple bypass. Two post-operative strokes and brain and other organ damage left him so ill that at one stage he could not be transferred from one bed to another.

He pulled through, however, and has been thriving until recently.

"He's been really well until the last two or three weeks but he's started to have trouble with his breathing and he's been going a bit blue," said mother Debbie, of Lucas Street, Newport.

"We knew he needed another operation. He was going to have it before the end of last year but he was doing really well so they left it. Now we're expecting to hear that he will be going in very soon."