A NEWPORT hairdresser is warning others to seek medical attention if they suffer heart palpitations, following her own key-hole heart surgery and in support of our Jack’s Appeal campaign.

Sara Moylan, 22, of St Julian’s, was diagnosed with Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome in 2012.

Ms Moylan, who recently graduated from Coleg Gwent with a VRQ Level 3 in hairdressing, said that she had been having regular palpations for years, but had accepted it as ‘normal’.

““I only found out that I had a heart problem in April 2012, and was put on a waiting list for the operation.

“I was getting ready for work when the palpitations started and they weren’t stopping. They were going on for 30 minutes, so I decided I would go to A and E instead.”

At hospital, it was found her heart was beating at 235 beats per minute.

She spent two nights in the Royal Gwent Hospital, Newport, while they gave her a drug to lower her heart rate.

Her immediate condition was successfully treated, but she was diagnosed with Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which is caused by an extra electrical pathway in the heart. Electrical signals can travel round and round in a loop, causing the heart to beat very fast and reducing the amount of blood being pumped around the body.

She underwent surgery at the University Hospital of Wales, Cardiff, in November 2012 and is now fully recovered. Fellow students have since raised around £100 for the British Heart Foundation through a cake sale.

Now Ms Moylan, a stylist at Celly’s Hair Salon in Newport as a hair stylist, has backed the Argus-run Jack’s Appeal campaign, which aims to get a heart defibrillator installed in every school in Gwent in memory of Oakdale’s Jack Thomas who died suddenly from a suspected heart condition aged 15 in 2012.

She added “It is important to get yourself checked out as soon as possible if you think anything is wrong.

“Everyone is allowed a flutter, but if they last more than 10 minutes, something is wrong.”