Let's give him a big hand. Mark Cahill, a former Royal Marine, had lost his right hand due to gout, but got a new hand from an unknown donor during an eight-hour surgery at the Leeds General Infirmary.
That hand was more successful than expected, as it helped him to save his wife, 51-year-old Sylvia. Recently, she had a heart attack and Mark used his hands to perform chest compressions till an ambulance arrived.
Initially, Mark heard a gasp and checked out on Sylvia, who had apparently fallen asleep in bed after she watched TV. But when he checked out on her, he found that she was not breathing, though her eyes were open.
Immediately he put a call through to emergency services. They tutored him on giving CPR. With his left hand, he performed the first CPR, and with the right hand, he just held the phone for eight minutes. But soon he got tired and switched his tasks. "I could not give up," he said.
Sylvia had been clinically dead for about 19 minutes, so paramedics, upon arrival, helped to revive her with the help of a defibrillator.
Mark exclaimed: "I knew getting my hand would be life-changing, but I never thought it would be life-saving as well."
Sylvia Cahill, who is still recovering from the heart attack, said: "Even before this, we were so grateful to the donor family for the new lease of life it gave Mark. Now we are even more grateful. I can't thank them enough."
