The mother of a five-month-old girl who died in hospital has told a jury that mistakes made by doctors, who thought her symptoms were down to Covid, were “unforgivable”.
Lynsey Carr told an inquest into the death of her daughter, Esta High, how the growing concerns of her and Esta’s father, Leon High, were “dismissed multiple times” over a 15-hour period before it was too late to save her life.
Hospital visit and missed signs
Wakefield Coroner’s Court heard how Esta was a “happy, healthy, smiling girl” before she became ill on October 31 2023. Her parents took her to the emergency department of Leeds General Infirmary with a high temperature and vomiting, and she later tested positive for Covid.
Ms Carr told the inquest jury on Thursday how Esta’s condition deteriorated, but her and Mr High’s concerns were repeatedly ignored by staff until it was too late. She said the family, from Leeds, was put in a side room at the hospital’s children’s assessment and treatment (CAT) unit where she believed staff were more concerned with isolating Esta due to the Covid risk than listening to her parents.
Parents' concerns dismissed
Ms Carr said she and Mr High refused advice from doctors to take Esta home as she had a temperature that soared to over 40 degrees and she would not stop vomiting. She said her daughter later developed a rash and her arm started shaking, which she feared was a seizure.
Ms Carr told the jury “we were extremely worried” and “we kept asking for help” but “staff were rude and don’t listen to our concerns”. She said her daughter’s symptoms should have been seen as a high risk of sepsis and, if the correct treatment had been started at this stage, “the damage to Esta’s brain could have been limited, reduced or not happened at all”.
She said that Esta’s time on the CAT unit was “15 hours that were filled with missed opportunities”. Ms Carr told the jury of five women and six men that her daughter’s grunting noises were put down to being “just uncomfortable with Covid”. And she said the family’s concerns over the arm shaking, which they captured on video, were “dismissed on multiple occasions”. She said that “staff ignoring this is unforgivable”.
Final hours and tribute
Ms Carr said that if the junior doctor had “showed more urgency” or called for an opinion from a more senior colleague “this could have saved Esta’s life”. By late afternoon on November 2, Esta could not be roused and the jury heard how scans and other tests showed evidence of meningoencephalitis and streptococcus pneumoniae.
Esta was taken to intensive care and attempts were made to save her life, but Ms Carr said it was all too late. Ms Carr said: “After 55 hours of no concerns at all, there were doctors running in and out of the room in a frenzy. The room was full of doctors and nurses trying to save our daughter’s life.” She told the jury: “Unfortunately, as our daughter had been left untreated for 55 hours, it was too late to save our darling girl.”
Earlier, Ms Carr wiped away tears as she gave a pen portrait of Esta to the jury. She said she was born in May 2023 and “this moment was something we have dreamed of”. Ms Carr said her daughter was “bright, beautiful and perfect from the first moment” and “when she arrived, she completed us”. Speaking next to a photograph of Esta, she said: “Her smile lit up every room – especially in the mornings when she woke as if full of joy just to see us again. She brought happiness everywhere she went.”
Ms Carr said: “She made us a family of three, and we were excited for every moment ahead. In just five months, Esta touched the lives of everyone who met her.” She said she did not want her daughter to be defined by the shortness of her life, saying she was “a little girl who deserved the world”. And she said: “In the five months with us she gave us a lifetime of love.” The inquest is expected to last 10 days.
