Meghan can’t breathe without laser machine
Wheezing
 “When Meghan was three she began wheezing a lot,” explains her mum Gillian in the family home in Mayfield, Dalkeith.
“The doctors thought it was asthma, but checks showed polyps in her throat.
“She was diagnosed with recurrent respiratory papillomatosis (RRP).
“It’s a rare disease which causes warts to grow in the throat and
the windpipe and means it is very difficult to breathe.
“If they were allowed to grow then she simply couldn’t breathe.
“At first her dad, Brian, and I were told she’d need a one-off operation and that would be it.
“But they kept coming back.
“Then we discovered the polyps had spread to Meghan’s lungs and windpipe.
Warts
“By the time she was four she had virtually no voice at all, needed the warts removed every six weeks or so and then had to have a tracheotomy after her breathing stopped completely.
“She was really lethargic and got out of breath just going up and down stairs.
“It was a really hard time for her and she could feel the warts as the time for her next operation grew near.”
Meghan put up with it all for four years, coping the way kids do with stuff they shouldn’t have to.
Then they had a breakthrough.
Doctors at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children at Yorkhill in Glasgow recommended Meghan be treated with a carbon dioxide laser that was much more efficient at removing the growths.
Haytham Kubba, Meghan’s consultant paediatric surgeon at Yorkhill, explained how the laser works and how it is vital to keeping
her and others alive.
Light
“Lasers produce a fine beam of light that can be used to cut tissues very precisely, sealing off bleeding at the same time. We find them essential
for working in areas that are difficult to get to, especially in paediatric airway surgery.
“The carbon dioxide laser, in particular, is ideal for use in a child’s larynx as it is very precise and doesn’t cause heat damage to surrounding tissue.
“This is very important when fractions of a millimetre make the difference between success and failure. We do about 50 laser procedures a year in the children’s ENT theatre. Most of these are children like Meghan with RRP.
“With surgery they can lead a normal life and the warts will eventually disappear. Children
come to Yorkhill from many parts of Scotland for this surgery.”
The laser treatment began last August and has made a huge and immediate difference to Meghan’s life.
Her tracheostomy tube was removed, she can now enjoy PE at school, she’s looking forward to going swimming for the first time and she can talk.
Boy, can she talk!
Lost time
“As soon as her trachy was removed she was off,” laughs Gillian. “She’s made up for lost time and hasn’t stopped talking since.”
She’s not wrong. No matter how many times I claim that I’m the one who’s supposed to be asking the questions, Meghan just ignores me and asks some more. Jeremy Paxman has nothing on this kid.
“What colour of pen are you using? Are you using full stops? When will this be in the paper?
“Do you have any pets?” No.
“Do you want to buy a dog?” No.
“Go on, give me your number,” she says with a mock whisper.
“I’ll phone you and we can do a deal for one of the dogs.”
No!
Injections
She tells me how she gets injections three times a week, how her body is full of holes and that it hurts. I start
to write it down.
“Are you putting that in the paper? That it hurts? You can’t put that in
the paper.”
But I’ll also say that you’re brave, I tell her. She thinks about it. “Hmm,
OK then.”
One of the main advantages of the laser treatment is that Meghan no longer has the sensation of the warts growing back by the time it comes round to having them removed again.
It means she can live a normal life and live it to the full.
However, there is a problem — and that’s where you come in.
“Seventeen years ago, members of the public were extremely generous
in their fund-raising efforts to buy us our first carbon dioxide laser, which has been in use every week since,” explains Mr Kubba.
“It’s now quite old and our engineers have noticed its power output is dropping year on year.
Disaster
“At some point soon, the laser will stop working completely.
“It would be a disaster for us, particularly for our children with
RRP, if it breaks down and we’re left without one to replace it.
“We’d like to replace it before that happens. The cost of a new laser is about £40,000.”
It is a lot of money, but the difference it can make to children
like Meghan in terms of their quality of life makes it worth every penny.
We’re sure Sunday Post readers will do all they can to help.
“It would be great if people raised the money for a new laser,” said Gillian. “It would mean so much to Meghan and so many other kids. Anything people can give would
make such a difference.”
Meghan aims to kick off the campaign herself. “I’ll sell all my
books and videos,” she said.
“We’ll have a car boot sale and I’ll even sell my Xbox.
“Do you want to buy something . . . ?”
 Children deserve the best, says Carol Smillie
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You can e-mail us at:
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Meghan smiles bravely in hospital, after one of her frequent laser operations.
