No one knew four-year-old Lilly Chugg was dangerously ill until she struggled to breathe one day last month.

Within hours of seeing her GP in Tasmania, Lilly was airlifted to The Royal Children’s Hospital where she was fighting for her life with kidney failure and subsequent heart failure.

Royal Children’s Hospital nephrologist Dr Joshua Kausman said Lilly’s condition, called renal dysplasia, affects one in every 1000 children, but just one in a million develops kidney failure.

Lilly’s kidneys were small and scarred, and she will need nightly dialysis until she can have a kidney transplant, which will give her the best chance at a normal life.

Relatives are being tested to find a suitable match but, if not, Lilly will have to wait for a donor organ.

“She’s definitely strong and brave. I don’t care how long our road is, as long as she’s alive,” Lilly’s mum Tamika Boulter said.