Express & Star

Oh boys! Twins Oliver and Charlie home for Christmas

Little twins Oliver and Charlie Leath will spend Christmas in their delighted parents' arms after months in hospital when they were born three months premature.

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When parents Steve and Joanne found they were expecting twins after six years of trying and two courses of IVF, they were "over the moon".

But Oliver and Charlie arrived at just 28 weeks on August 24, both weighing 2lb 8oz, and had to endure months of treatment at Wolverhampton's New Cross Hospital.

Charlie has been back at their home in Moor Park, Perton, for a month – but Oliver, who suffers from a heart condition, was only discharged two weeks ago. A duct in his heart has remained open and he will need an operation to close it at Birmingham Children's Hospital in the coming weeks.

He struggles with breathing and sometimes has to be fed through a tube in his nose, but Steve, a 34-year-old photographer for the Express & Star, says he is "delighted" to get him home for the first time.

He added: "It's superb. With Oliver needing an operation we thought we would be going to visit him at New Cross on Christmas Day."

The drama began when Joanne, an assistant manager at a DIY store, started having contractions the night before they were due at hospital for a scan. She was put on a steroid drip and the birth was delayed for four days. But when the contractions came on again, she was given a caesarean.

To their relief, Charlie started crying as soon as he was born, but Oliver had stopped breathing and was taken straight to intensive care.

Two days later, as there was no room in the neonatal ward at New Cross, the twins were transferred in an ambulance to Gloucestershire Royal Hospital in Gloucester. Mr and Mrs Leath stayed in a flat there run by the Ronald McDonald House charity.

Four days later they returned to New Cross, and were there until their conditions improved. "We are very grateful for everything the staff have done for us, they've been fantastic," said Steve.

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