A toddler is now "99 per cent cured" after being treated for a previously "untreatable" brain condition, in what is believed to be a world-first operation at Liverpool Children's Hospital.
Conor O'Rourke, now three, was diagnosed with Vein of Galen malformation (VoGM) during an appointment for an unrelated condition.
The rare brain condition only affects 10 to 12 babies a year in the UK and causes veins and arteries in the brain to connect abnormally.
This increases blood flow and leads to complications if it is undetected.
Mother, Lucy O'Rourke, 38, said Conor was only eight or nine months old when she took him for treatment relating to a separate issue.
O'Rourke said: "[The doctor] was looking at his belly button, and then suddenly wanted to ask me questions about his head.
"Obviously, I was slightly confused at that point. I didn't really know what the issue was. I'm just looking at my beautiful baby and didn't think that there was an issue."
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|Conor undergoing his treatment
O'Rourke said the consultant asked about the shape of her son's head.
She recalled: "He felt like he had quite a pronounced forehead. It was quite a large head."
After the conversation, O'Rourke contacted her GP, and Conor was sent for an MRI scan.
The family then discovered their son had a "significant brain issue".
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|Conor pictured with mum Lucy
O'Rourke said: "It was only after those scans that they said to us that they think it's Vein of Galen malformation and then started to explain to us a little bit what that meant.
"But, in reality, they'd never seen it before in Bolton."
Conor was sent to Alder Hey Children's Hospital in Liverpool and underwent three operations called endovascular embolisations.
This involves inserting a catheter into the arteries, typically from the groin.
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|Conor and his family pictured with nurses and doctors
Doctors discovered Conor was part of a small group of patients whose veins were blocked off, preventing them from getting to the malformation.
This then causes the jugular veins in the neck to be blocked off, which causes the veins from the brain to try to drain elsewhere.
Surgeon Conor Mallucci said this was causing swelling and damaging the toddler's brain stem and spinal cord.
Mallucci said: "It's a fight against time - and that happened quite early in Conor, which is why we had to come up with this alternative route."
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|Conor with surgeon Conor Mallucci
The operation accessed the malformation through Conor's skull and targeted the affected blood vessels.
Connor has recovered well and is now considered "99 per cent cured" by Mallucci.
Conor's mother said: "As much as I feel like this is an incredibly unlucky diagnosis, I sometimes have to pull that back and think, actually, we were incredibly lucky in a lot of ways.
"We were already under a consultant at Royal Manchester Children's [Hospital], who mentioned something.
"And then we were also incredibly lucky, in a way, that I'm very much an over-thinker and I was an anxious mum, to not leave it there. And thank goodness that we did. Because if we didn't, I don't know where we would actually be."