A three-year-old girl died three months after being sent home from A&E because doctors “missed opportunities” to find out she had a rare illness.
Ryleigh Hillcoat-Bee was taken to the hospital when she got sick while on vacation with her family in North Wales.
The little girl’s blood had “extraordinarily high” levels of Creatine Kinase and potassium.
The signs and symptoms point to a serious muscle problem. and rhabdomyolysis. Even so, Ryleigh was sent home from the hospital.
After three months, her parents Caroline and Andrew rushed her back to A&E because she was having trouble breathing.
At Blackpool Victoria Hospital, she had a heart attack and died on Monday, November 8, 2021.
Alan Wilson, the area coroner for Blackpool, said at an inquest last week that there had been several “missed opportunities” to look into Ryleigh’s inability to move around before she was released in August.
Speaking for Ryleigh’s parents As a medical negligence lawyer named Diane Rostron put it, “the hospital was given clear advice from colleagues in Leeds during Ryleigh’s admission in August 2021 to get specialist advice from a neuromuscular specialist.”
“If they had done that, they would have been able to diagnose rhabdomyolysis and get advice on how to treat a flare-up.” After finding out what was wrong with Ryleigh, the hospital would have given this information to her parents while they looked into what was really wrong.
“Ryleigh died on November 8, 2021, just three months after being sent home from the hospital where she was born almost three years before.”
“Instead of being told that Ryleigh had rhabdomyolysis and the parents being given advice on how to safely handle this, my clients were told that Ryleigh would get better as quickly as she got sick.”
“We believe that Ryleigh’s death could have been prevented and have been instructed to pursue a medical negligence claim.”
Andy Hillcoat and Caroline Bee, Ryleigh’s parents, said, “We are very sad about the death of our little girl.” I had to fight hard for a full investigation into her death. It has been a long and hard road.
“We are heartbroken by the coroner’s decision, even though there is strong evidence that Ryleigh’s rhabdomyolysis flare-up in August 2021 could have been managed well.”
“We believe that Ryleigh should still be here today, but she was not given any chance of survival.”
President of Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Chris Barben, said, “First, I want to send my deepest condolences to Ryleigh’s family and everyone who was touched by her life, both personally and on behalf of everyone at the Trust.”
“While we know this cannot bring Ryleigh back, we will be carefully considering the Coroner’s findings around the way the Trust conducted itself during this tragic incident to ensure that we learn everything we can from what happened and work to prevent anything like it happening again.”
The year 2022, Caroline’s sister-in-law Katie Hobbs ran the Royal Parks Half Marathon and organized a charity event to raise money for The Compassionate Friends. The event raised over £3,000.
Katie wrote on the GoFundMe page, “My sister-in-law Caroline and her partner Andrew’s daughter Ryleigh died suddenly and out of the blue in November of last year.”
“The loss of her has been terrible for her parents and everyone who knew her.”
“She was a cute little girl with a big smile who brought so much magic and joy to everyone she met.”
“I’m running for the compassionate friends because they helped Ryleigh’s wonderful parents get through the worst time of their lives.”
“The charity have put them in touch with other bereaved parents and have organised a retreat they will go on to meet each other in person.”