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Chickenpox claims life of ‘quiet, lovely girl’
A GIRL died five days after contracting chickenpox, an inquest heard on Tuesday.
Edith Neville School pupil Sheikh Nadia Yazmin, eight, was taken by ambulance to University College London Hospital, five minutes from her home in Ossulston Street, Somers Town.
But the hospital’s Dr Brent Taylor who led the resuscitation attempts told St Pancras Coroner’s Court that on reaching the hospital Sheikh Nadia was beyond saving.
Medical technician Malcolm Ritchie said: “She had been unwell since Monday and this was Saturday.
“She’d been scratching all over.”
The court heard she had symptoms of lethargy, high temperature and vomiting, which worsened on Saturday.
Paramedics arrived at the home in a fast-response car ahead of an ambulance.
Sheikh Nadia’s family said they considered assessments by two lots of emergency medical staff unnecessary.
Sheikh Miah, her brother, said: “Why did it take so long. If they (the fast response car) came to short-cut the time, why did you ask the same questions again?”
Mr Ritchie said he was following procedure and needed to be clear about what treatment would be needed in the ambulance.
An emergency siren was not used and the hospital was not forewarned.
Sheikh Nadia suffered a cardiac arrest 40 minutes later and was pronounced dead just after 11pm that night.
A post-mortem examination revealed she died from a bacterial infection in the lung and spleen as a consequence of chickenpox.
Coroner Dr Andrew Reid said: “In retrospect, knowing how rapidly her condition deteriorated, as she arrived at hospital, knowing what we know, a different decision might have been made. Whether blue lights and sirens would speed up the journey to hospital we don’t know.”
Outside the court her brother described her as a “quiet, lovely girl”. Translating for his mother, Sireen Begum, he said: “She says she has no faith in the ambulance service.”
Sheikh Sufian Miah, Sheikh Nadia’s father, told how his neighbours had planted a tree in her honour. “Everybody knows she is dead, everybody is crying,” he said.
Verdict: natural causes |
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