A mum who beat coronavirus burst
into tears as the NHS staff who brought her back from the brink of death gave
her a standing ovation.
Medics at Darlington Memorial Hospital in County Durham
cheered Sarah Wood, 35, as she was wheeled out of the intensive care unit (ICU)
just days after her fiancé was told to prepare for the worst.
She was in a medically-induced coma for almost two weeks and
hooked up to a ventilator as nurses and doctors did everything they could to
save her life.
As she lay unconscious, staff told her devastated partner
Christopher McCurdy, 32, that she was critically ill and she "might not
come home from the virus".
Ms Wood, who has a five-year-old daughter, Amber, turned a
corner after staff tried a "new technique" - a tracheostomy, where a
tube attached to a ventilator was inserted into her windpipe through a hole in
her neck - to help her breathe.
The coronavirus survivor has been brought out of the coma
and continues to recover in hospital after she was released from ICU, also
known as the intensive treatment unit (ITU), on Tuesday.
She told Mirror Online: "I got a standing ovation as I
came out. It was very overwhelming and emotional. I cried as they were wheeling
me off the ward."
Ms Wood, one of the youngest patients to come out of the
ward having beaten Covid-19, and Mr McCurdy have hailed NHS staff for saving
her life.
She hasn't seen her fiancé or daughter since she was
admitted on March 27. Both had contact with her when she had the virus, but
neither has developed symptoms.
Speaking from her hospital bed, Ms Wood said: "I can’t
thank the staff in ITU enough. Without them my daughter wouldn’t have a mum, my
partner wouldn’t have me.
"I don’t think I would have pulled through it. I
certainly wouldn’t have survived on my own.
"They all kept telling me to fight for my daughter and my partner and my family,” she said.