The Mermaid

0 Comments | Sunday Mirror, Aug 15, 2004 | by LUCY LAING

MOST parents proudly declare that their baby girls are like little mermaids when they first start to swim.

But when Tiffany Yorks was born she was - almost literally - a mermaid. Her legs were fused together and her feet stuck out like fins. Her lower limbs were a virtual copy of a mermaid's fishy tail.

It may sound quaint and charming, but for sufferers of this rare condition it has always meant dreadful suffering and early death.

Until Tiffany came along.

Now 16, with long, tanned legs, she is _ a walking monument to the doctors' skill - the only person in history to have survived one of the most complex medical procedures known to man.

There have only been 300 cases of babies born alive with "mermaid syndrome" - also known as sirenomelia. The other 299 have died within days due to heart defects and complications with bladders and kidneys.

Tiffany has confounded all the odds. And, in what seems her ultimate triumph, she has indeed turned out to be a little mermaid, never happier than when she is swimming. "I just love being in the water," she says. "When I'm swimming I look down at my legs and it seems amazing that the surgeon has given me this chance to live a normal life."

To say she is lucky to be alive is to massively understate what happened to her. When she was born, at the Old Riverside Hospital near her parents' home in Florida, doctors told her mother there was little or no chance of survival. Her legs and feet were joined together in the classic "mermaid syndrome" manner, and she had no bladder.

Her grandmother, Jane Kliven, remembers with a shudder how the family were told of Tiffany's condition. "I went into complete shock. I'd never heard of anything like it before. She was rushed by helicopter to a specialist hospital in Tampa. I knew that babies with this condition didn't survive, but despite everything I never doubted that she would make it."

Few had Jane's confidence. Even Mutaz Habal, who carried out Tiffany's surgery, knew her chances were slim. "Most of these babies die from lack of oxygen as, like Tiffany, their heart arteries aren't in the right place and cannot deliver oxygen around the body efficiently," he says.

"We were able to keep Tiffany alive mainly because her condition had been diagnosed while she was in the womb, so we were able to give her oxygen as soon as she was delivered." But keeping her alive in those crucial early hours was only the start of it. Surgeons then began a series of ground-breaking operations to separate her lower legs.

Tiffany had no fewer than five operations in her first 12 months of life.

"This was all new territory for us," says Dr Habal. "It was extremely complicated surgery. Nothing like it had been attempted before. But we successfully managed to create two separate legs for Tiffany."

After her oper-ations she was fitted astonished doctors by learning to walk at the age of three.

Jane Kliven - who took over Tifany's care when Tiffany's mother was seriously injured in a car crash - recalls that magical day. "It was a wonderful moment. We just couldn't believe it. My husband and I were eating breakfast when Tiffany suddenly walked over to her playpen. I couldn't stop crying. It seemed like a miracle to see her walk. She was finally standing on the legs the surgeons had created for her, finally able to do normal things like other children. When I took her to the hospital clinic, the doctors were just as surprised as we were."

If there was any justice after all she had been through, the following years of Tiffany's life would have been smooth, uneventful and happy. Unfortunately it was not to be. Her mother had been badly hurt was in the car crash when Tiffany was just 14 months old, losing the use of both her legs and suffering brain damage. Luckily Jane was on hand to take over the role of mum.

Then, at the age of nine, Tiffany tripped over a dog lead, breaking her reconstructed left knee and ankle. Even now she has to use crutches to help her walk, but is due for another operation soon.

Apart from her leg surgery, Tiffany has also had several heart operations to correct the function of her main arteries and allow the blood to flow freely around her body.

But she refuses to be daunted and actually says she's looking forward to her next operation. "I've gone through so many, but it has been worth it," she says. "When I see pictures showing what I looked like when I was born, it seems like a miracle."

with knee braces, and underwent extensive physiotherapy. But in the end it was all down to Tiffany - her determination and spirit. She