Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Baby born without blood


You can hardly tell today, but when six-month-old Olivia Norton was born, doctors were shocked by her 'ghost white' body.

Olivia was born with a condition so rare it is likely to be written in to medical textbooks – she was born without blood.

The condition known as fetomaternal haemorrhage meant Olivia's blood ran back into her mother's system, leaving her with such a low heamoglobin count it couldn't actually be considered blood.

Fetomaternal haemorrhag is found in around one every 5000 babies, and can occur spontaneously or due to trauma.

Doctors gave Olivia less than two hours to survive, but thanks to rapid blood transfusions, her skin returned to a normal shade of pink within hours.

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