The Toddler who had a 39 minutes heart stop is making a recovery

Zach Hilary, who is twoyears old, suffered a heart attack on Jan 26, when his mother, Trudy, found him collapsed on the floor, groaning, at their home.

She called 999 and performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on her son for 10 minutes until the paramedics arrived and took over. The boy received more than half an hour of
CPR, including on his transfer to hospital.

Mrs Hilary, a paramedic, and her husband Dave, an IT consultant, were told that their child had swelling on his brain. Doctors warned them to prepare for the worst. The boy was put into a medically induced coma and there were concerns that he could suffer brain damage.

But Zach recovered, he has relearnt all of the skills he had picked up and now has the full abilities of a two year-old. He has had to learn to eat, hold a cup, walk and talk all over again, all in the past few months.” She said he had been watching television when he suffered the heart attack. Initially she thought he was playing around, but then she dialled 999.