PLUCKY Aimee Read was taken into hospital on New Year's Eve to undergo a life-saving bone marrow transplant.

The operation signals the end of months of anguished searching for a donor match for the five-year-old from Moorcroft in Edenfield.

In December a mystery donor provided a match after a check of more than 300,000 would-be donors had been unsuccessful.

During her nine-week stay in hospital, Aimee, who has leukaemia, will be kept in isolation from everyone but her closest family.

The youngster will spend three or four days in Royal Manchester Children's Hospital in Pendlebury and will then be transferred to Christie's Hospital in a "safe" car to undergo radiotherapy.

On January 9 Aimee will return to Pendlebury to undergo the life-saving operation

Her grandmother Mrs Vicky Read said: "Aimee has been told what will happen and she seems to be coping. But I think she is too young to really understand what is going on."

Mrs Read, of Callender Street, Ramsbottom, admitted Aimee's parents, Mark and Wendy, were scared about what would happen over the coming weeks.

"At the moment they are feeling quite scared and upset but are very hopeful.

"They are to sort out a shift rota to make sure one of us are with her all the time," she said.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.