Baby Mabel Rose is officially on the transplant list for a new heart.
A successful surgery in February gave the 3-month-old girl a Berlin Heart, a device that mechanically supports heart function. Since her birth, Mabel Rose had been intubated. With the Berlin Heart, she breathes on her own.
“Right now, we’re in the rehab stage of things, where we’re trying to reverse some of the negative side effects of long-term intubation,” said Hanna Correal of Lake Worth Beach, Mabel Rose’s mother.
Mabel Rose was born Dec. 13, 2025, with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, a condition where the left ventricle and aorta of the heart do not fully develop, preventing the heart from pumping blood throughout the body properly. She was also born with a diaphragmatic hernia, making her condition a rare and often fatal combination.
Hanna and her husband, Mateo Correal, learned of their baby’s condition just hours after her birth, when doctors transferred Mabel Rose to Nicklaus Children’s Hospital in Miami. Hanna and Mateo were quick to recognize the severity of it all: Their newborn needs a new heart.
UF’s Shands Children’s Hospital embraces Baby Mabel Rose, her parents
After Mabel Rose’s initial treatment at Nicklaus, the University of Florida’s Shands Children’s Hospital accepted her case. It moved the family from Miami to Gainesville, where Dr. Mark Bleiweis, the director of UF Health’s Congenital Heart Center, operated on Mabel Rose. He inserted the Berlin Heart, which manually pumps blood through the body using an external drive, on Feb. 3.
Dr. Bleiweis’ cardiac team was the first in Florida to use the Berlin Heart in 2006, even before it was approved under the FDA’s Humanitarian Device Exemption in 2011.
“He’s very great, but also very humble,” Hanna said, adding, “We see him walking around almost every day.” She said it’s been important to her and her husband to know to whom they’ve trusted their baby’s life.
For six of her eight weeks of life, the Correals were unable to hold, feed, or even change their baby due to the multitude of wires and tubes attached to Mabel Rose. Now that she can breathe on her own, they can do more of the things that first-time parents may think are a given or take for granted.
Next challenge for Baby Mabel Rose is finding a donor heart
Mabel Rose is now officially Status 1A on the heart transplant list, giving her top priority. Because of her young age, finding the right heart for Mable Rose will be difficult.
The good news is that Mabel Rose is ABO compatible, meaning she can receive a heart of any blood type, even though she is O-negative. If a heart were to match, but not by blood type, surgeons would perform an operation known as “washing” the heart, effectively converting the organ to a universal type O.
“Mateo and I both say we wish we could just rip our hearts out and give them to her,” Hanna said.
Neither Mateo nor Hanna has worked since Mabel Rose was born. They have relocated to Gainesville and secured an apartment just eight minutes from the hospital. A grant from the Kemp Foundation of Palm Beach Gardens has helped them cover their costs.
Hanna says she and Mateo now have a much healthier routine with Mabel Rose’s hospital visits.
“When we come in, we’re ready to go, rather than sleep-deprived,” Hanna added.
Hanna also said Shands has a supportive community of mothers with children who have life-threatening conditions. A 1-year-old boy is just down the hall from Mabel Rose, and Hanna says it gives her so much hope to see them.
Mabel Rose is expected to be in the hospital for the next six to nine months, pending a heart transplant.
To donate, go online to www.childrensheartfoundation.org and GoFundMe.org and search for “Mabel Rose.”
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Baby Mabel Rose breathes on her own as she waits for a new heart
Reporting by Haley Dockendorff, Special to The Post / Palm Beach Post
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
