Heart defect connects Rose with Rose Bud

MOST Rose of Tralee contestants like to say they have a special connection with children they meet during the festival celebrations, but for one of this year’s hopefuls there is a definite reason to bond.

In June, Sunderland Rose Noreen Feeney qualified for next week’s event after navigating the competition’s British regional finals, held in Portlaoise.

Like all other entrants who reached the stage, the 24-year-old clinical hospital pharmacist who was born in New York but spent her childhood in Armagh was assigned a Rose Bud — a child supporter for the event.

However, unlike other hopefuls, after hearing that her Rose Bud, eight-year-old Dublin girl Puteri Rameli, was due to undergo heart surgery for a potentially life-threatening condition, Ms Feeney realised the pair had more than just a fascination with the Rose of Tralee event in common.

When the Sunderland Rose was 16 she was also diagnosed with the same heart defect as Puteri, resulting in successful surgery a year later which set her on the path towards a career in medicine.

“It was really such a coincidence, even the Rose of Tralee organisers didn’t realise the link until we told them,” said Ms Feeney, whose mother was the 1980 Leeds Rose.

Although Puteri was scheduled to have her operation in June, she asked for it to be postponed until later in the summer when the opportunity to be a Rose Bud appeared.