Nip/Tuck star Julian McMahons mercy dash home for dying mum

JULIAN McMahon's mercy dash home to visit his dying mother Lady Sonia McMahon provided him with the opportunity for a much-needed back operation aimed at ending years of pain.

arThe Nip/Tuck star's decision to undergo the operation at St Vincent's Private Hospital in Darlinghurst united mother and son under one roof - and enabled the much-loved Lady McMahon to spend the last week of her life with her adored boy.

Lady McMahon, the widow of former Prime Minister Billy McMahon, died last Friday night two weeks after being admitted to St Vincent's.

Her death followed a cancer diagnosis in 2009 resulting in the removal of a melanoma and lymph nodes. After her admission to hospital three weeks ago, Lady McMahon's specialists focused their attention on her lungs where, sources claim, doctors discovered she had lung cancer. Friends believe this was the previously unannounced primary source of the disease.

After her daughters Melinda and Deborah alerted their Hollywood-based brother of their mother's poor condition, the actor made arrangements to return home. Realising he would spend a fair amount of time at her side, the actor booked himself into the same hospital to deal with an unspecified degenerative back problem.

One of the hospital's top neurosurgeons, believed to be Dr Tim Steel, is understood to have performed delicate surgery on the actor on the weekend of March 28 - which was six days before his mother's death.

He was immobilised after the surgery and it was a couple of days before mother and son were reunited, by which time Lady McMahon's condition had deteriorated considerably.

It is not known whether McMahon, who had a private room in another ward, was with his mother when she died late on the evening of Friday, April 2.

However, it is known that the heart-throb actor checked out of the hospital the following day.

This week, Lady McMahon's three children and two granddaughters, including McMahon's daughter Madison, have been making preparations for a private cremation and send-off for their mother and grandmother.

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