Help out South Hills baby with new liver
Darren can be contacted on 061 314 0195, alternatively Wendy’s sister Nikita Odendaal on 084 470 5319.
A YOUNG couple in the South Hills is enduring unbearable pain as their four-month-old baby boy fights for his life and is in need of a liver.
His parents, Darren van der Hoven (22) and Wendy Odendaal (19) only hope for the miracle to save their only son. Baby Liam Lee-Dave Odendaal from Boskuil Street is suffering from biliary atresia and is growing worse day by day.
Biliary atresia, also known as extrahepatic ductopenia, progressive obliterative cholangiopathy or “Kotb disease”, is a childhood disease of the liver in which one or more bile ducts are abnormally narrow, blocked, or absent. It can be congenital or acquired.
Darren said two weeks after Liam was born they realised he had yellowish eyes and they thought it was an infant jaundice.
“My boy was then admitted at Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital where he was diagnosed with biliary atresia after an operation. If we can, we could have donated our liver; however, he is too tiny for ours,” he said.
Liam just turned four months on Sunday, August 21, and he desperately needs a liver transplant. His parents said he took medication but that is a temporary solution for him.
Though Darren does odd jobs here and there he hopes a good Samaritan will come along and help their son. “I would prefer a private hospital at this point for our son to get help because they haven’t put him on a donor list and the next check-up at the hospital is in October this year. We will appreciate any individual or charitable organisation who can help us at this point because our son is suffering and we do not know until when,” pleaded Darren.
He can be contacted on 061 314 0195, alternatively Wendy’s sister Nikita Odendaal on 084 470 5319.
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