A THREE-year-old boy was left fighting for his life after a rare combination of common bugs attacked his heart. Freddie Julian had come down with what his parents thought was a virus - but within days he was placed on life support and underwent emergency heart surgery. "It was the worst experience of our lives," Freddie's mum, Vickie, from Powys, Wales said.
"The thought of losing your child is horrific." The lawyer first noticed that her youngster was unwell on June 16, when he developed a fever and she felt swollen glands at the back of his head. That night, she rushed him to the out-of-hours doctors, who told her it was a virus .
Read more on common viruses Over the next few days, Freddie just got sicker, vomiting and falling asleep around the house. Concerned, Vickie took her son to see another GP on June 19, who reassured her that Freddie "only had a virus". However, the little boy continued to grow more unwell.
"By this point, he had stopped eating, his arms and legs were freezing, his lips were blue, and his eyes kept rolling to the back of his head," Vickie told The Sun. Most read in Health At a loss for what to do, Vickie and her husband Steven rushed their son to Prince Charles Hospital in Merthyr Tydfil on June 20, where a cardiac paediatrician scanned his heart. Doctors soon discovered he had an enlarged liver and fluid around his heart.
Within a few hours, medics were forced to put Freddie on life support after his heart began to fill with blood and failed to fun.