Girl, 13, ‘asked mum if she would die’ before being killed by sepsis --[Reported by Umva mag]

A 13-year-old girl in ‘unbearable’ pain was ‘wincing and squirming’ moments before dying from sepsis after pain relief was delayed, an inquest heard.

Chloe Longster asked her mother if she was about to die after being rushed to the Kettering General Hospital in Northamptonshire on November 28, 2022.

She had woken up with pain in her ribs and cold-like symptoms and was admitted to the paediatric ward, Skylark, that same evening.

The patient was later transferred to intensive care where she was intubated, and died the following morning.

Her mother, Louise, told the inquest at Northampton Coroner’s Court on Monday that pain relief for her daughter was ‘delayed’, arguing that her death was ‘completely preventable’.

‘Chloe asked if she could be put to sleep because it was unbearable. I remember thinking how pale and clammy she looked,’ her mother said.

‘It is harrowing to see your own child in so much pain. She was clock-watching constantly.

‘She knew when her paracetamol and ibuprofen were due and it was always delayed. It was like we were chasing her pain rather than getting on top of it.

‘Chloe asked me if she was going to die. It is haunting that the 13-year-old was the one that was right. It ‘s devastating.’

Louise said she heard her daughter’s chest ‘crackling’ as she lay in the hospital bed, which she flagged to a nurse.

The mother said she felt that she was being a ‘nuisance’ and ‘dramatic’ because she was trying to get more help for Chloe.

It was not until Chloe was put in a side room and diagnosed with influenza A that it was ‘taken seriously or acknowledged how much pain she was in’, Louise told the court.

Chloe’s blood pressure was recorded for the first time on the system nearly eight hours after she arrived at the hospital.

A&E consultant Dr Marwan Gamaleldin saw her three or four times before she was transferred to the paediatric ward and believed she had a chest infection at the time.

He said: ‘It was already flagged that pain was the main thing. She did not come across as struggling to breathe.

‘The pain was described as severe so the next logical step was to jump to morphine.

‘She had four doses of pain relief with three different medications. I appreciate that maybe it was not enough, but it was four doses of pain relief.’

Dr Gamaleldin said that in the two-hour period that he observed Chloe, he ‘did not think’ that she had sepsis as she had none of the mandatory signs.

He said her chest X-ray showed ‘consolidation’ on her lower left lung, where there is solid material rather than air, which suggested an infection.

Louise said the scan looked ‘terrifying’ and Chloe’s lungs were not symmetrical.

Nurse Tricia Martinez triaged Chloe when she arrived at the hospital, but she had only recently joined the paediatric ward.

She told the court that the girl looked in ‘agony’ when she arrived in A&E so she ‘escalated’ the issue and asked for the V-ray, but did not tick one of the boxes on a sepsis screening document.

She said: ‘The fault on my part was that I was not able to complete the sepsis form or go back to it after escalating.

‘During the time that I saw her, something within said that there is something wrong with this child.

‘We can only suggest or say she has possibly this or that, but the diagnosis will be given by the doctor.’

The inquest continues.

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