AN ANGRY mother has claimed her baby almost died from a condition which doctors failed to recognise.

Rachel Edwards says she plans to make a formal complaint against Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals Trust (SATH), where her child was treated for burns, because she says doctors failed to recognise that her child was suffering from Toxic Shock.

Her 16-month-old son was left with devastating burns after he poured his mother’s mug of scalding tea onto himself on Sunday, October 29.

The one-year-old grabbed the mug from a dining room table at the family’s home in Welshpool, splashing the boiling liquid onto his face, arm and stomach.

A distraught Mrs Edwards called an ambulance and the toddler was rushed to the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital (RSH).

Mrs Edwards, 30, said: “He was treated by a doctor, who put a dressing on and said it was fine to go home that night but asked us to bring him back the following Monday to have the bandages redressed.”

Mrs Edwards took her son back to RSH on Monday, October 30, and said she had concerns that the burns had become infected overnight.

She said: “When I took him back to Shrewsbury, I said that I thought the burns were infected. I mean for me, it was all very obvious because they had become crusty and yellow.”

However, Mrs Edwards concerns were met by assurance from doctors that her child was fine.

She said: “To be told once again that nothing was wrong and to go home, it just felt like nobody cared.

“As a mother it was frustrating for a doctor not to listen.”

“It just feels like we were part of this conveyor belt, to get you out of hospital as quickly as they possibly can.”

Not willing to accept what she had been told by doctors at RSH, Mrs Edwards persisted to get answers.

She said: “He was suffering with sickness and diarrhoea badly by the Tuesday afternoon so I took him to our GP, who said that it could be Toxic Shock. We decided to drive straight to Telford to get him checked over once again.”

The toddler was then taken by ambulance, to be treated at Birmingham Children’s Hospital, in the early hours of Wednesday (November 1) morning.

Mrs Edwards said: “I was told by doctors at Birmingham that if I hadn’t have taken him to Telford, I probably would have lost him that night. He was so poorly that doctors had to scrub the burns to get the infection out, to the point where he bled.”

She said: “I will be writing a letter to the Chief Executive at Shrewsbury Hospital.”

Dr Edwin Borman, medical director at The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SATH), said: “We are sorry to hear that the child’s family have concerns about the care received.

“Whilst we cannot discuss individual cases in detail, I can confirm that we have been contacted by the child’s family, who have been supported by our Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS) and advised of the procedure to formally raise those concerns.”

He said: “We have not, to date, received any formal complaint from this child’s family but, should we do so, we will look into it, as we would do with any complaint we receive.”

Mrs Edwards said: “We’ve been to hell and back as a family, so many different emotions have been involved but mostly anger because I was not listened to.

“If I had not acted on my mother’s instinct anything could have happened.”

Rachel and her husband, Graham Edwards, would like to thank staff at Birmingham Children’s Hospital.

She said: “I cannot fault Birmingham Children’s Hospital they have been absolutely fantastic and did everything they could for our boy.”