TWO years ago Liz Tilbury was unconscious in a John Radcliffe Hospital ward, having failed to wake up after a four hour emer-gency heart operation.

On Sunday she was back at the Oxford hospital, but this time to abseil down the five-storey Women’s Centre with 100 other volunteers, raising money for the JR’s new heart unit.

Miss Tilbury, 56, of Sunderland Avenue, Oxford, was rushed to the JR in January 2008 after complaining of swollen ankles to her GP.

When medics examined her, they found two heart valves had been struck by a virus and she needed an urgent operation.

But despite the successful surgery, she did not come round from her anaesthetic.

For a week, her family, including niece Eleanor Tilbury, who joined her in the sponsored abseil on Sunday, kept a vigil by her bedside, fearing the worst.

Eleanor, 18, from Preston Crowmarsh said: “I was there the whole way through the surgery and it was horrible. When she did not wake up, it was scary. Obviously the first thought is she would never come round, but she proved quite a fighter.”

After waking, Miss Tilbury spent another four weeks in hospital, beginning her slow return to normality.

She said: “It took a year to get really fit again.

“I lost a lot of weight, about two stones, when I did not come round from the anaesthetic.

“Basically, if it was not for the John Radcliffe Heart Centre, I would not be here.

“The staff were brilliant and I just wanted to give something back to them.”

Also abseiling were Dee Phillips, 52, and her daughter Nikki, 22, from Blenheim Close, Didcot, who completed the challenge in memory of husband and dad Alfie, who collapsed and died aged 52 while playing football nine years ago.

Mrs Phillips said: “I had a phonecall to say he was not well, but by that time he was already dead.

“He was a very loud Geordie. He would definitely be up for doing this today. He would be saying, ‘Get yourselves up there, and just go for it’.”

Meanwhile, despite a strained ankle, 80-year-old Susan Pickering completed the fourth of seven charity abseils she hopes to make this year.

More than £20,000 for the heart unit was raised.

Hospital fundraiser Graham Brogden said: “It has been an emotional day. There are lots of personal reasons why people take part and we are very grateful for their support.”