‘Normal, healthy’ 11-year-old girl died in her sleep from silent condition, which one in 1,000 Britons can have

A father has told of his heartbreaking agony after his ‘healthy’ 11-year-old daughter died suddenly in her sleep.

Steve Pritchard, 43, said his daughter, Matilda, had gone to bed ‘normally’ on the night of April 2 this year, showing no signs of being unwell.

But the following morning, Mr Pritchard and his wife, Anna, 43, discovered Matilda had gone into cardiac arrest in her sleep.

Despite the best efforts of paramedics who arrived on the scene within two minutes, she was pronounced dead on arrival at hospital.

Pritchard, a business director from Pudsey, Leeds, said it was later revealed Matilda had an undiagnosed heart condition called arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy.

It is a genetic defect that causes the heart muscles to be weaker than normal and thus have to work harder to pump blood, which can result in a potentially fatal cardiac arrest.

The gene that causes arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy occurs in about one in 1,000 people, although not everyone who carries it will develop the condition.

Both Mr and Mrs Pritchard and Matilda’s older sister Olivia have now had more tests to find out if they too have the condition.

Matilda, 11, went to bed as usual one April evening earlier this year, but she never woke up

Her parents, who discovered Matilda unresponsive the next morning, desperately called 999 for help, but despite the best efforts of paramedics who rushed to the scene, she was unable to be revived

Her father Steve, mother Anna and older sister Olivia later found out that Matilda had an undiagnosed genetic heart condition that caused the organ to fail in her sleep

“We were immediately concerned about Olivia,” Mr Pritchard said.

‘She’s 14 and the symptoms usually start around 13. But everything has come back completely clean – we all have it.’

People with arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy may experience symptoms such as palpitations, fainting, shortness of breath, swelling, and chest pain and discomfort.

But it can sometimes show no symptoms at all, or it can only appear when a person gets older, although it can still kill even if there are no signs.

The condition is usually diagnosed using scans to examine the size of the heart as well as tests to measure whether it is beating in a normal rhythm.

There is no cure for arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy, also called arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathy, but treatments are available.

These are most often drugs that help support the heart, but other options include having a pacemaker installed, implants that monitor the heart and sound an alarm if a problem is detected, or heart surgery.

Such treatments aim to reduce symptoms, helping people with the condition to live a normal life, as well as reducing the chances of potentially dangerous complications.

Matilda’s said their daughter was a passionate environmentalist who loved animals and helped pick up litter in her local area

As part of honoring her memory, Matilda’s family have set up a fundraiser for the charity Keep Britain Tidy

An estimated 64,000 people in the UK are estimated to have a faulty gene which can lead to the condition.

Matilda’s family are now taking steps to honor Matilda’s ‘last wish’ – to ‘liberate the world from waste’.

Pritchard said: ‘It’s been catastrophically awful – but I hope we can start the process of our little girl’s dream of a world without waste.’

An ‘animal lover’ and ‘passionate about the environment’, Matilda loved picking up litter in her local park.

In her memory Mr. Pritchard has set up one online fundraiser for the charity Keep Britain Tidy, which aims to fund an education program it runs for five years – one for each of the secondary school years Matilda had ahead of her.