THE parents of a baby battling a rare medical condition need to raise £50,000 for an operation to save her life.

Lily-Mai Steele, 15-months, was born with a vein of galen malformation which affects the blood vessels in her brain, and puts a dangerous amount of strain on her heart and other organs.

It has also caused Lily-Mai, who is registered blind, to develop a host of other medical problems, including severe brain damage, cerebral palsy, water on the brain, sleep apnoea, and epilepsy.

Her parents, Laura Murray and Shaun Steele, are desperate to send their daughter for a special operation in New York to seal the vein.

Laura, 24, of Saints Walk, Chadwell St Mary, said: “The operation will not improve Lily-Mai’s quality of life, but without it she will die.

“She has severe brain damage and its is very unlikely that she will ever walk, but she is happy and she isn’t in pain, that is all I care about, I want her to live.”

The operation would be at the Roosevelt Hospital, under the care of Dr Alex Berenstein, a specialist in the field.

Despite her difficult start in life, Lily-Mai is smiley baby who can recognise the different voices of her mum and dad, and older sister Leia, who is two.

Laura said her baby is “a fighter” and has already defied doctors odds by surviving this long.

In March 2011 she had complications after an operation at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London, and was put on a life-support machine.

Doctors told the family there was nothing more they could do, and they were withdrawing their care.

Lily-Mai was transferred to Little Havens Children’s Hospital in Thundersley for end of life care.

Laura and Shaun were warned that the tot probably wouldn’t survive longer than an hour once her ventilator was switched off, but Lily-Mai refused to give up her fight for life.

Shaun, 24, said: “One hour came and went, then two, and so on.

“We went to sleep that night and we were dreading what we would see when we looked in her cot in the morning, but for the first time in weeks she was laying there with her eyes open and over the next two days she just got better and better.

“We phoned Great Ormond Street and told them she was still alive, they couldn’t believe it.”

Laura and Shaun are in the process of organising some fundraising events for Lily-Mai, but anyone can make a donation now by going online to http://www.gofundme.com/g0k4g.