They say there is an unbreakable bond between a mother and her daughter.
For this family from China’s Shaoxing city, the tie between Li Yueye and her child Ling Ling is even more special.
This week, seven-year-old Ling Ling braved a four-hour operation to donate her bone marrow in order to save her critically ill mother.
Ling Ling (pictured) went through a four-hour operation in China to donate her bone marrow
The girl’s mother, Li Yueye (pictured), has a rare disorder needs her stem cells to survive
A brief video released by Pear apparently shows Ling Ling during the operation on Monday
According to local media, 30-year-old Li was diagnosed with acute aplastic anaemia in May. Aplastic anaemia is a rare disorder in which the bone marrow fails to make enough blood cells.
Doctors said Li’s condition could worsen any time and she needed to undergo a stem cell transplant as soon as possible in order to survive, reported Qianjiang Evening News.
To Li’s family, finding a bone marrow match proved to be difficult because Li was adpoted.
Qiangjiang Evening News said Li was abandoned by her birth parents when she was little. After she fell ill, her husband managed to find her biological parents, trying to ask them to go for a test and see if they would be bone marrow matches to Li. But Li’s birth parents firmly refused.
That means Ling Ling, who is the only blood relative to Li in her family, became the family’s last hope.
Her father said the girl agreed immediately when being asked to give her bone marrow
A nurse treats Ling Ling in the girl’s hospital ward after she donated her bone marrow
The girl greets her mother though the glass, accompanied by her father, after the operation
A test showed that Ling Ling was a half match to Li.
Li’s husband pondered over the matters and decided to ask Ling Ling if she would agree to donate her bone marrow.
The little girl said ‘yes’ without a second thought, telling her father ‘give my cells to mum, I hope she could recover soon’, Li’s husband Dong Haiyong said.
Doctors at the Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital of Zhejiang Province collected Ling Ling’s bone marrow on Monday.
Medical staff told Qianjiang Evening News that they harvested 200ml bone marrow from Ling Ling in about four hours. They said the child was strong and cooperative throughout the process.
Ling Ling’s grandmother weeps as she says ‘this breaks my heart, my granddaughter is so little’
Ling Ling’s grandmother said she felt so sorry that her granddaughter had to go through the procedure.
‘This breaks my heart. My granddaughter is so little. But this is for her mother to get better,’ she told a reporter from Zhejiang Satellite TV from Ling Ling’s hospital ward.
Ling Ling’s hematopoietic stem cells were transplanted into Li’s body the next day, and doctors are observing Li this week and next to see if the transplant was successful.
The medics are optimistic though. They told Zhejiang Satellite TV that Li has an 80 per cent chance of a full recovery.