SITTING up in her hospital room, and wearing make-up for the first time in several weeks, Georgina Burt yesterday gave an emotional thanks to the surgeons who have saved her life.

She is looking forward to getting back home and enjoying a cup of Marks & Spencer tea.

The 53-year-old is the first Scottish patient to have a heart transplant at the Golden Jubilee National Hospital's West of Scotland heart and lung centre since the advanced heart failure service moved from Glasgow Royal Infirmary. TIMESFILE THE Scottish Heart Transplant unit opened at Glasgow Royal Infirmary in 1992 and operated alongside other cardiac surgical services.

But it was almost killed off eight years later when consultant Surendra Naik quit under the pressure of covering a 24-hour, seven days a week on call rota on his own.

Glasgow's health board was criticised for allowing just one man to be responsible for all of the department's work after refusing to hire another talented doctor who moved to Newcastle's Freeman Hospital.

The Health Minister Susan Deacon angered patients when she warned the unit might be shut down under a UK-wide review of transplant services.

Her successor Malcolm Chisholm decided the unit should stay open after two lung surgeons from the Western Infirmary volunteered to retrain to help save the unit and were joined by a new boss, Andrew Murday from St George's Hospital in London.

The unit expanded to include a more in-depth heart failure service, reflecting the fact new drugs and surgical techniques are able to sustain people's hearts in many cases where a transplant would have been the only option in the past.

Last year, operations were suspended after a review showed a higher death rate than normal but an external review of the unit and the kind of patients treated there found that there was no undue risk and it reopened in January.

The centre, which became operational in May, was opened by the Queen at the start of July.

"I feel absolutely brilliant," said the former supermarket worker of her transplant, which she received four weeks ago. "Anybody who comes to see me says they see a difference in me.

"When I came in here, I wasn't well at all."

Georgina had been suffering for several years from cardiomyopathy, which causes the heart's muscles to become enlarged or thickened, without any obvious cause.

Her condition deteriorating rapidly, she was transferred to the ultra-modern Clydebank hospital six weeks ago, and was put on circulatory support until a heart became available.

The average waiting time for a new heart in the UK is six months.

Georgina will spend a week recuperating in the adjacent Beardmore Hotel before finally returning to the Falkirk home she shares with her husband, Tom, 56. They have a son, Allan, 25, a police officer in London.

Today she told how her con- dition had frequently left her feeling exhausted.

"I was always tired, but always tried to get on with things," she said. "I never really said to people that I was ill. I knew myself that my health was going down and down.

"I used to get up in the morning, put my make-up on, and that made me feel better.

"I could hardly walk up the stairs in the house. I used to go down in the morning and try do to some work, and when I went back up the stairs I just used to do housework up there - I had my ironing-board up there - then I'd just lie in bed again.

"I knew something was wrong. Even when I went to my GP, he kept saying it, but you just put it to the back of your mind and tell yourself you'll be fine."

It was after she suffered from a stroke that Georgina under-went hospital tests and learned that she had cardiomyopathy.

She saw an expert at London's Heart Hospital and then had a defibrillator fitted at Glasgow Royal Infirmary.

"They'd told me right at the beginning that I would eventually need a transplant, but I didn't want to think about that at the time."

When she arrived at the Jubilee, she says, she was apprehensive about getting a new heart. "Your mind constantly changes: Will I get one? will I not?

"It was a difficult time, but since I've had it done, what a difference there has been, even to the extent of going down to the treadmill here. I could never, ever do that before."

Georgina recollects the Monday morning four weeks ago when she got her new heart.

"I was in the theatre and they were waiting on a phone call. I just looked at the clock on the wall. I think it was 5.16am then I was out' for a couple of days."

When she came to, she remembers there being a tube still down her throat and trying to signal for a glass of water. She also felt very cold.

But she has since made a good recovery. One biopsy has come back clear, and another one will be done next week.

Georgina is keen to return to her old life but knows she will have to take things easy.

"I'm all right when I'm in here," she said. "I go down to the gym twice a day and I'm quite happy, but I don't know what it'll be like when I get home.

"There are plenty of people here who you can talk to about different things, and I've got a phone number that I can ring up at any time.

"I have lost an awful lot of weight and they give you three months to get that back up, but you've got to watch what you're eating - there's quite a big list of things to watch.

"But I feel so much better than the way I felt months ago. I would like to go back to work sometime again.

"Once I get back home again, I'd like a nice cup of M&S tea and get back into the way of the house again. I can't wait to get back home again."

Georgina paid tribute to the care she had received at Clydebank and for a moment she is overcome with emotion.

"The care here has been perfect, from the moment you walk through the door," she said. "Everybody I have been dealing with ... perfect."

Her consultant, Andrew Murday, said: "We first saw Georgina a couple of years ago when she was not bad and was on tablets for cardiomyopathy.

"But she came back to us at the beginning of July, very unwell, having acutely deteriorated over a few weeks.

"We needed to treat her with intensive life support in effect, with an intra-aortic balloon pump, and I made sure she was suitable for transplantation and that that was what she wanted, and we were fortunate enough to get a suitable organ.

"She has her transplant and her recovery is encouraging."