A SCHOOLGIRL, who is suffering from a rare genetic condition, is having a bone marrow transplant in the New Year.

Amy Parry, eight, has been diagnosed with a condition called Fanconi Anaemia and has been referred to Pendlebury Hospital in Manchester.

The condition affects young children and untreated can lead to a high risk of leukaemia and subsequent head and neck cancers.

Three donors across the world have been identified with the closest match being in Canada, Now the family, mum Louise, 48, dad David, 50, and sister Emily, 14, of Sandown Crescent, Sandiway, are appealing for people to support a charity set up to help families with the condition and help with research.

Amy will have to spend five to six weeks in hospital for the transplant, and then will have to remain off school for some months.

Louise described how she noticed something was wrong with her daughter, who is a pupil at Sandiway Primary School.

She said: “She has always been petite but she bruised really easily.

“The school were concerned about it. We felt under the spotlight.

“What finished me off was when I went upstairs one day, she was having a bath and the whole of her back was black. She had been playing football.”

In August 2007 Amy was taken to the doctors who did blood tests which revealed she had a low blood platelet count.

Doctors kept their eye on the situation until she was referred to Pendlebury Hospital in April this year and a few weeks later the full extent of the condition was revealed.

Louise said: “I was gobsmacked.

“It was completely out of the blue. I wept.

“Until then I had thought it was just routine.

“My other daughter Emily had to be tested for the condition and also to see if she was a match – unfortunately she wasn’t.”

Louise wants to raise money for the Fanconi Hope Charitable Trust set up by parents affected by the condition and which wants to set up a national registry to promote research.

She is organising a fundraising charity dinner to be held at Tatton Park in March 2010.