Our Christmas miracles: Healthcare staff reflect on standout experiences as December 25 approaches

Emergency heart surgery, cutting-edge epilepsy treatment, life-saving organ transplants, switching a cancer drug just in time, and a terminally ill patient finding hope — six healthcare workers share their experiences and memories

Dr Kieron Sweeney, neurosurgeon, Dr Ronan Kilbride, Professor David Webb, neurologist, and Dr Donncha O’Brien, neurosurgeon photographed at the Children's Hospital, Crumlin. Picture: Moya Nolan.

On Christmas Day, many healthcare staff won’t open presents or eat dinner — instead, they’ll head to hospitals and emergency units to keep services up and running. Very often, what sustains them are what could be described as ‘miracle’ outcomes, some of which occur at Christmas.

We ask six healthcare workers to share their thoughts and memories.

‘I’ll never forget you saved my life’

• Dr Saber Hassan, clinical director of Urgent Cardiac Care, Mater Private Network

Dr Saber Hassan, Director of Urgent Cardiac Care at Mater Private Network at his office in Dublin. Picture: Gareth Chaney

“Last year, I was on call on Christmas Eve. I was in cardiac care when a senior nurse said we’ve an ST-elevation myocardial infarction [more serious heart attack type with greater risk of serious complications and death].

“The patient was taken to the catheterisation lab. We don’t usually wait for blood results in such circumstances — where there’s increased weight, high cholesterol and the patient is a smoker. I did the angiogram and found the artery to the front of the heart, the main artery, was blocked in the middle. I opened it, put a stent in — her pain eased.

“She’d been complaining of pain for a few days but, preparing for Christmas, you don’t want anything to ruin plans. She was kind of ignoring the symptoms until the pain got pretty bad.

She spent another day in hospital and went home on December 26. Two weeks later I saw her. After the consultation, she shook my hand with her two hands. She said, ‘I’ll never forget you saved my life’. You can’t put a price on that.

“It’s difficult to anticipate an outcome. She did have a heart attack. If I didn’t get the artery open, a lot of heart muscle would have died. Even if she survived, she’d have at least a moderate degree of heart failure, which she doesn’t have now.

“We do our job mostly as a routine thing, but occasionally, in this case and many others, you really feel the impact of your work, either by saving a life or making it better after intervention. That’s the best thing about our job.”

We’re just delighted for Mikey

• Dr Donncha O’Brien, neurosurgeon, Children’s Hospital Ireland

Dr Donncha O'Brien, neurosurgeon. Picture: Moya Nolan.

“Mikey, 14, has drug-resistant epilepsy. He was having terrible seizures — explosive convulsions, losing consciousness, his airways impacted, and being brought to hospital every other week.

“Neurologist Prof David Webb, based in Crumlin, referred Mikey to us – my partner Kieron Sweeney and I do the epilepsy surgeries between Beaumont Hospital and Temple Street.

“We scanned Mikey and did a surface EEG but they didn’t show the exact abnormality in a way we could remove it. We have a new technology – Stereo EEG, Dr Ronan Kilbride interprets it – where we insert a series of small electrodes into the brain with a robot system. Mikey underwent this procedure in September.

“We put 10 or 11 depth electrodes in the right side of the brain, towards the back. We knew the seizures were coming from that area, but not the precise location.

Mikey was then monitored in Temple Street for seizure activity. The electrodes, all now inserted, were connected to an EEG recording system. He had a very bad seizure after a few days and had to go to ICU.

“Lo and behold, one electrode showed where the seizures were coming from. That gave us a target area of brain tissue for removal. This was done 10 days after first putting in the electrodes.

“The operation went very well. It has more or less stopped his seizures. He’s had one or two brief ones but compared to before they’re infinitesimal. Mikey is one of two children in Ireland who’ve received this surgery here.

“We’re just delighted for Mikey and his family. Neurosurgery is a tough business. There are other conditions you don’t get good outcomes from, but from epilepsy you often do. Mikey’s case and the other patients involved complicated medical science, but it’s a miracle result.

“At this time of year, we only get one or two days off, but you reflect and look back on the cases we’ve done. You get satisfaction from all the patients you’ve helped. Mikey is one of those.”

To support the appeal to develop The National Neurosurgical Centre for Ireland, see: exa.mn/Beaumont-Fundraising

Second chance for valued colleague

• Mary Holden, communications manager, Coombe Hospital

Communications manager at the Coombe Maternity Hospital Mary Holden at the Hopsital in Dublin's city centre. Picture: Gareth Chaney.

“A few years ago, two weeks before Christmas, I was on the DART travelling to work around 7am when I got a text from a colleague: ‘On my way to Beaumont for a possible kidney transplant’.

“It was a complete shock. This youngish man had been having dialysis for some months, three times a week. He was still working — I couldn’t believe the level of work he was doing while being so poorly. But those of us around him thought a transplant opportunity was a long time away.

“That day — I think a Thursday —was a complete blur. This colleague was the ‘go to’ person in the Coombe, somebody I worked very closely with in administration. Healthcare workers know the risks of transplant and, at this time of year, we were highly aware of infection risks.

But first, tests were needed to ensure the transplant could go ahead. To say we worked that day on tenterhooks is no understatement. Obviously, we couldn’t get in touch and ask ‘What’s happening?’ so the suspense was even more intense.

“To our amazement, the next day, we received a text from the recovering patient saying all went well. He was in a good bit of pain but was up (though not quite getting about). It was clear from the text that he was brilliant. I was happy and left him to have some privacy.

“But on Christmas Day, I wondered, should I text or not? Half an hour of ‘Will I, won’t I’, I sent the text. I was thrilled to get a response within minutes saying he’d been discharged on Christmas Eve to return home to his family. What a Christmas present!

“That Christmas Day brought home to me that another family had an empty space at their table. I thought ‘how are they today?’ And that days like Christmas, Easter – if a family has had to make a decision to donate an organ – are going to be marked by a huge degree of sadness. And the sadness is only tempered by knowing they’ve been able to give another person a second chance at life.

“It’s a courageous decision at an awful time, a huge thing to give the gift of life. Without them, people like my colleague wouldn’t be living a good quality of life a couple of years on.”

Restored faith in our treatments

• Dr Michael McCarthy, consultant medical oncologist, Galway University Hospital

Dr Michael McCarthy, consultant medical oncologist outside Galway University Hospital. Picture: Ray Ryan

“We operated successfully on a 58-year-old woman with advanced vulvar cancer in June 2023. This summer she came back, her cancer had relapsed and spread widely. She was in liver failure.

“It’s a rare cancer with few good treatments available. In July, we did a biopsy of her liver to make sure it was the same cancer. We started chemotherapy straightaway because she only had a short time to live.

“She had three doses of chemo three weeks apart. Each time we tested, she was going further into liver failure. Clearly, the chemo wasn’t working. We looked at her liver biopsy — it showed an even rarer type of cancer than we’d thought: vulvar cancer of mammary type. It looks like a breast cancer but started in the vulva.

We switched immediately from the non-working chemo to cutting-edge hormonal cancer treatment that we’d use for breast cancer. Within eight weeks, her liver function tests were normal.

“I certainly thought, when the first chemo failed, that she wouldn’t be with us this Christmas.

“Today, she’s managing treatment very well with few side effects. With treatments working, I expect she has many years of good quality life ahead. It’s rare somebody has that degree of liver failure and it turns around.

“Most of my time is spent concentrating on cases where things aren’t going well.

“This restored my faith — in treatments we have available, in the benefits they can bring. It’s very refreshing to be able to give someone good news. The lesson is to always be persistent, to check every last possible option.

“It can be emotionally challenging to live people’s hard stories with them in real time throughout the year. Christmas – a time of shared cultural values when everyone comes together – there’s this sense of peace and goodwill that can exist if we try.”

Leading a full life after a transplant

• Dr Angie Brown, medical director, Irish Heart Foundation, and consultant cardiologist

Dr Angie Brown, Irish Heart Foundation.

“A 58-year-old patient had significant heart failure. His heart function was deteriorating, his symptoms worsening despite medical therapy. He had very limited exercise tolerance and poor quality of life. So we arranged investigations and assessments for heart transplant. Soon after, I moved hospitals.

“A year later, I was walking in the local gardens, and this same patient came over and thanked me for referring him for heart transplant. It had transformed his life. It takes time to recover from major surgery, but he was now able to go for walks with his wife. He was on immunosuppressant medication but leading a full life.

“It was wonderful to hear he was so dramatically improved. It struck me that Christmas that year would be much better for him [than the previous year]. He’d be able to enjoy his family’s company without feeling unwell, breathless, fatigued, anxious. It felt like a Christmas miracle.

Christmas is a poignant time for those who’ve lost loved ones – the loss often feels more profound. It’s a difficult time for people with chronic illness or who are alone or homeless.

“Hospital staff can find it particularly rewarding working over Christmas when patients often need them most. But it can be sad too for healthcare workers whose families are abroad, who they won’t see over Christmas.”

Make moments matter

• Helen Forristal, director of nursing, Marie Keating Foundation

Helen Forristal, director of nursing at Marie Keating Foundation. Picture: Patrick Browne

“Tommy Doyle joined the Positive Living Group in June 2020, a year after being diagnosed with metastatic lung cancer. He was 75.

“The group was set up originally for women with metastatic breast cancer, mostly young mothers, to address unmet needs of having incurable cancer — being on treatment, dealing with side-effects and with emotional aspects: isolation, loneliness, fear of impending death.

“When covid hit, these women were cocooning. Afraid to go out, to meet family, you can imagine the anxiety that built up. We started having webinars, twice-weekly meetings.

“Pre-covid, chemotherapy was a social outing for Tommy — he met people in the day unit. Suddenly, he was having treatment between four walls, on his own. A real family man, he was now cocooning and dealing with the loss of his health, feeling lonely, isolated in his cancer world.

“He approached the Marie Keating Foundation to connect with people in a similar situation. When I offered that he join the group, he was reluctant. I also needed to ask the ladies if they were OK with a man coming into the group. They were. Tommy attended his first, online, meeting with his wife, Celine.

The ladies embraced him with open arms and heart. They wanted to care for him, mind him. They understood the loss and grief of himself, of his health. They knew their own anguish and loss, and how to manage it — it was always about remaining in the moment.

“Tommy became very dedicated to the group. He’d found his tribe, people to talk to about cancer – it was important to him to protect his family. His isolation began to fade. This group was a safe place to talk about what next, his destiny, the length of time left to live.

“He came to the group lost and forlorn. He transformed — he was more vibrant, talking, having fun. The ladies loved him — there was a lot of tenderness. One said ‘When covid’s over, we’ll all go out for tea’, he just lit up.

“He participated in a lung cancer awareness campaign —it was titled ‘Making Moments Matter’. He wanted to tell his story so people would know the signs of lung cancer.

“Tommy had become resilient. Most of all, he had hope. He hadn’t believed he’d live ’til Christmas. Now he was thinking ‘I might well be here’. It motivated him to keep going. He was determined to have their best Christmas ever —him and Celine. And they did.

They had their family over, four children, their partners, seven grandchildren. He enjoyed a couple of Baileys on ice with Celine, some of the grandchildren had a sleepover.

“Making moments matter was what that Christmas was about for him — living life to the full, being grateful for simple things, for the moment.

“Tommy died in May 2021. He filled my heart. I watch a lot of people come towards the end of life. When they’ve hope it makes a huge difference. Celine said the difference in him was phenomenal. He had a voice, he got himself back, he was happy.

“It’s important to live in the moment as much as you can, to take the goodness from it. Christmas for me is about connecting with those we’ve lost, celebrating their lives – and also celebrating life and new opportunities.”