Woman fitted with battery and electricity powered heart

A British woman has been fitted with an electric heart powered by batteries and mains electricity.

Anne Higgins - who is nicknamed Electric Gran - has to plug herself in to the mains at night to stay alive because she has been fitted with a mechanical heart which has also left her with no pulse.

The 56-year-old lady told the Daily Mirror newspaper: "All my friends call me the Electric Gran. I’m powered by batteries by day and by the 240-volt mains at night.

“I no longer have a pulse. My heart’s still there beating but the blood doesn’t flow through it. The blood goes through the mechanical one.

“After the op, the doctors gave us a stethoscope to listen to my heart.

"Instead of a beat it’s a swishing sound … like a twin-tub washing machine."

Anne was fitted with the mechanical body part after suffering a huge heart attack in March 2009 and admitted she thought she was going to die.