About Bernice

This is the story of my little Bernice. I had miscarriage for my 1st pregnancy and Bernice is my 2nd pregnancy. When I’m 9 weeks pregnancy, Dr. Lim found out that I have low hemoglobin and want to check more on both of us (my husband and I). We have to do blood test.

After that Dr. Lim diagnosis both of us are the carrier of Beta Thalassemia. 50% of the pregnancy will be Thalassemia Trait (Minor), 25% will be normal & 25% will be Thalassemia Major. What’s that? At that moment, we are so confused. We have never come across this word. Dr. Lim refers us to KKH to look for Prof. Ivy Ng in order to find out more about Thalassemia. A brief understand of Thalassemia. Thalassemias are a group of genetic blood diseases that cause a reduction of the production of normal hemoglobin in the red blood cells. Children with thalassemia major are usually normal at birth but soon develop symptoms of paleness, headaches, fatigue and shortness of breath, jaundice and enlargement of the spleen. They may not want to eat and they may vomit frequently after feedings. Thalassemia is treated with certain drugs and needs regular blood transfusions.

I have to do Chorionic villus sampling (CVS) than will know the outcome. CVS test can only be done on the 12 weeks of pregnancy. Dr. Lim doesn’t do CVS at her clinic so she refers me to Mount Elizabeth Hospital to look for Dr. Ann Tan. We have to wait for two weeks in order to know the result. Dr. Lim fixed an appointment with us when the result is out.

Once we entered Dr. Lim's room, her expression was very sad. We can tell the result from her expression. I just straight away asked her, is it a bad news for us? Her replied : YES! The test result shows that Bernice was a Thalassemia Major. My tears fall immediately. Why we are so lucky. Only 25% chance might get major and my little Bernice is one of them. Dr. Lim asked us to decide whether to continue the pregnancy or abortion. It is up to our decision.

After our consideration, we have decided to keep our little Bernice. Maybe there are some complications during pregnancy but I have a very successful pregnancy. I managed to go through the whole pregnancy without any complication. It’s my 39 weeks of pregnancy. Bernice was born at Mount Alvernia Medical Centre on 4th Feb 2004 (Wednesday) at 2353 hours through caesarean due to she passed motion. Her weight was 3.46kg & 50cm in height.

Bernice had her first appointment checkup at KKH on 16th Feb 2004 with Prof. Ivy Ng for Thalassemia. Prof. Ivy Ng told us that every six weeks we have to bring Bernice for hemoglobin blood test. If her hemoglobin was low (about 8gm/dL), need to have blood transfusion. Hemoglobin will be range for normal people are Male are 13~18gm/dL and Female are 12~16gm/dL. We did asked Prof. Ivy Ng why Bernice hemoglobin can be as low as 8gm/dL before transfusion. She told us that the more times she had her transfusion; the iron will be overload in the heart & kidney area. This is to lower the chances of iron overload but time to time comes, she still have to face iron overload problem one day. People who has Thalassemia Major will need to start medication to reduce iron once it is overload in the kidney or heart. Either need to take oral medicine or injection or both methods.

Bernice starts oral drug that chelates iron called deferiprone (L1) medicine when she was 2.5 years old.


Lately we decided to let her go for cord blood transplant using her brother cord blood. So she has to start using the Desferal injection (Refer to diagram as shown below).

For Thalassemia Major patient, they have to inject every 5 or 6 days per week, it is depend on their condition.


It's too bad that our little Bernice can’t make it during the transplantation but we really hope she is now rest in peace.

Desferal injection

Desferal injection

Don't worry Bernice! You will always be remembered

Don't worry Bernice! You will always be remembered
Not only Daddy, Mummy & Di Di Miss you alot. It's everyone :)

Dora the Explorer. It's my most time favourite cartoon!


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Kids Kampong on 18th April 2008

Today is Friday and it's daddy off day. He say want to bring me go for fishing. He loves fishing. After we had our lunch, we took bus 88 from bishan to Pasir Ris Farmway 1. The journey took about 45mins. In the bus, I quickly take a short nap :) When reach, daddy wake me up.
Daddy paid for the entrance fee and bought a pack of fish food for me to feed the fishes. We went to see gooses & rabbits before proceed to the fish ponds.

Goose pond

Rabbit in the cage

Wow! All Koi fishes in the pond are so hungry. Think one pack of the fish food is not enough for them.

See all the Koi fishes fighting for food.

Wait! I still have some left. After feeding the Koi fishes, we go to play fishing game whereby one uses a rod to hook up a fish. Souvenirs are redeemable based on the weight of the fish caught.

Caught it, caught it daddy! Feel very happy :)

Seem like I caught a medium size one.

The uncle passes me a fish net for what? Dad, what should I do with the net? Dad brought me over to the Long Kang Fishing. We can enjoy the fun of fishing using nets & buckets. Yeah yeah yeah!!!

I have two fighting fishes for my souvenirs. After that we went home. I told grandpa must remember to feed my fighting fishes.

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She likes to watch & play Playhouse Disney Mickey Mouse Clubhouse :)


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Sometimes she will also likes to choose Disney Princesses. Eg. Bags, clothes, shoes, etc.


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