Birmingham’s first liver transplant was carried out 30 years ago today. Health Correspondent ALISON DAYANI catches up with a city patient who made history after being given a second chance at life.

PROUD mum Yvonne Munro is grateful for every moment she shares with her son Kelsey.

For without a life-saving transplant, Yvonne would not be alive today and neither would her beloved boy.

Just three years after having a new liver, the administration assistant found herself pregnant and became the first woman in Europe to give birth after receiving a transplant.

It was a feat considered near impossible when transplantation was in its early stages, three decades ago.

“I remember holding Kelsey in my arms after he was born and it felt like all my Christmases and birthdays had come at once,” said Yvonne, from Little Haywood, near Stafford.

“The doctors didn’t tell me the dangers and that I was the only pregnant woman after a transplant outside America as they knew how frightened I would be.

“I’ve always cherished how special he is. Kelsey is now 23 and he is still just as precious to me.”

Memories came flooding back to Yvonne, now aged 62, on today’s 30th anniversary of the first liver transplant in Birmingham at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

The procedure was carried out by surgeon Paul McMaster but the patient died soon after.

And it was during those early, pioneering days when a 36-year-old Yvonne went under the knife in March 1985.