Give Blood, Save Lives: Highland mum remembers how donors saved four-year-old after terrifying dash to hospital
A mum will be forever grateful to the blood donors who helped ensure supplies were there when her four-year-old daughter badly needed them.
Katie Rose was just four years old when she had to be rushed to accident and emergency after she began bleeding days after having her tonsils removed.
Mum Nichola described the incident as “terrifying”, bringing home to her how precarious life can be and how the kindness of strangers can be crucial in times of desperate need.
Katie, now 11 years old and a P7 pupil at Dalneigh Primary in Inverness, had suffered from concurrent tonsilitis when she was very young, with doctors eventually deciding a tonsilectomy was necessary.
The operation went well with the family advised tat there was a less than one per cent chance of any complications afterwards.
However they were also advised that, should any bleeding occur during the recovery period, they should call 111 for advice.
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“She had been home for 13 days and everything was going fine when I noticed a tiny little blood in the sink as she was brushing her teeth,” Nichola said.
““It was the amount you might get if you bit your lip or grazed yourself or something like that - nothing really, but I thought I should call anyway.”
She was stunned to be told that, despite the small amount of blood, she had to get Katie into A&E within 30 minutes and immediately bundled her into the car and headed for Raigmore Hospital.
While in the car Katie started to cough.
The cough worsened during the journey and escalated into a massive haemorrhage in one of Katie’s blood vessels.’
Nichola continued: “By the time we’d arrived at the hospital, Katie’s lips had turned white.
“I carried her through the doors of A&E in my arms while passers-by cleared the way to help us.
‘By the time doctors had managed to examine Katie, they estimated that she’d already lost over half a pint of blood.
“For her tiny size, it was absolutely terrifying.”
“Katie was taken into resus and given an emergency O negative blood transfusion to stabilise her long enough to give doctors time to establish her blood type.
“Thankfully blood donations were there for Katie when she needed them, and the team managed to stop her bleeding. Following the trauma, Katie needed to spend time in the high dependency unit before being moved to the general ward to recover further.”
Nichola, who works in the diabetes clinic in Inverness, says that despite the passage of time the family will always remember how Katie was helped.
“We’ll always remember what strangers did for us that night when our little girl, Katie, was just four years old,” she said.
“By giving up an hour of their time they gave us a future together and we’ll never be able to thank them enough for that. We’ll never take anything for granted again.
“When you read and hear about these things you always just think to yourself that it’s another person’s story, something that would never happen to you or your loved ones.’
“As a family, we now know all too well that these things happen to ordinary people just like us and they can happen so quickly.
“Someone out there saved our daughters life that night and we’ll never forget them for that.
