Aria to be discharged from hospital this week

SOMETHING TO SMILE ABOUT: Aria MacDonald even got to taste her cake when she celebrated her fourth birthday.

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Sevens months, two organ transplants and one birthday after she was admitted to Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, Aria MacDonald is poised to leave her hospital bed behind.

Four-year-old Aria has been a patient at the hospital since December, when she travelled there with her family in a last-ditch effort to save her life.

The Auckland pre-schooler was born with a rare condition that prohibited her from digesting food.

Without a multiple organ transplant, she had months to live before she died of liver failure.

She fought for her life after her first bowel, kidney, liver and pancreas transplant in February, enduring a dozen operations and multiple infections before her body finally rejected the new organs.

A second transplant in May was more successful, and she has been able to enjoy her first tastes of food.

Now the army of medical staff who have looked after Aria have told her parents, Anita and Hamish MacDonald, that she can be discharged from hospital this week.

Mrs MacDonald said the family was "happy and pleased and thankful and relieved" that Aria would finally be leaving hospital.

"Things were really, really bad the first time round and I don't think we understood how close she was to not making it.

"We are finally on the other side and I can look back and say I'm glad we came."

There were still many months to go before the family could bring Aria home to New Zealand, however.

"There's a million things that can go wrong post-transplant," her mum said.

"It's going to be a huge decision to come home. Best-case scenario, we could start to think about coming home in six months' time, maybe. But I'd definitely like to think we'd be coming home in a year's time."

Aria needs physical therapy to get her walking again after months in bed and also has to be taught to eat properly.

However, she has already been drinking water and milk, and trying little bits of solid food.

That included a taste of cake at her fourth birthday party, which the MacDonald family celebrated last month.

Hospital staff gave her a children's Easy-Bake Oven, in recognition of her new-found ability to eat.

Aria really wanted to leave hospital, Mrs MacDonald said.

"Now she's well ... she's much more aware of the fact that she's not at home with Mum and Dad."

Aria's transplants were funded by two grants, totalling about $4.5 million, from the Health Ministry's special high-cost treatment pool.

- © Fairfax NZ News