Derby cyclist hoping to win more World Transplant Games medals

Diana Higman already has seven transplant games gold medals

A Derby woman is heading to Australia to represent the United Kingdom in the World Transplant Games.

Diana Higman is to compete in the event where all the athletes are recipients of organ transplant.

The 60-year-old underwent an emergency liver transplant in 2008 after she developed hepatitis and doctors told her she had 72 hours to live.

The cyclist, a veteran of several transplant games, said she would be thinking of her donor when she rides.

Ms Higman, from Allestree, has already won seven gold medals at previous transplant games, and hopes to secure more at the games in Perth.

She said: "I'm very excited both to compete again and to go to Australia.

"I just want to get there and get going.

"I'd like to win gold but you don't know who you will be going up against until you get there."

Diana said she hopes her donor Helen would be proud of her

Ms Higman she had been training to become a nurse when she regularly started feeling tired.

Following tests, she was told her liver had shrunken to a dangerous size, and was rushed into theatre in Birmingham.

She said after her operation she was inspired to take up cycling after seeing a poster for the British Transplant Games on a hospital wall.

That inspired her to take up riding and was the beginning of a new post-transplant career on the track.

She said: "I do it for Helen, my donor, and I hope she would be proud."

Mrs Higman will be one of 3,000 athletes from across the world at the games which will take place from 15 to 21 April.