My London, 20th November 2020
Niki Mason’s 14 year old son, Finn, had never shown any signs or symptoms of a heart problem but she booked him for one of Cardiac Risk in the Young’s (CRY) free heart screenings last November as a precaution. His family were shocked when the screenings resulted in him being diagnosed with Wolff-Parknson-White condition; a condition which causes the heart to beat abnormally fast for periods of time. As it is a relatively common condition, they initially did not think he’d need to have surgery, however this changed during lockdown when Finn began to experience symptoms for the first time and was given a heart monitor.
After a gentle bike ride cause him to experience particularly strong palpitations which meant that he had to go into hospital and then be monitored closely even when he returned home, it was decided that he should have a surgical procedure called ablation, which destroys the extra part of the heart causing the problems in the heart’s electrical system.
“We walked into that hospital at a quarter past seven in the morning, and he walked back out a quarter past seven in the evening, essentially completely cured of something that we never knew he had,” said Niki.
“A neighbour of mine who’s a surgeon had said to me before, when I told him his heart rate went up to 289, that that’s really, really fast. He said, ‘you know, that there can be all sorts of complications with your heart going that fast and it can end up being fatal.’ So, you know, if it wasn’t for CRY, registering with them to do this, who knows what would have happened?”
