I WANT MY SICK GIRL HOME
Family’s plea for help to get sick baby back home
YOUNG Gold Coast mother Elisha Robinson is desperately trying to get her baby girl home from Thailand before her legs are amputated.
Eight-month-old Lilliana Sheridan has been fighting for her life for five days after contracting meningococcal caused by septic shock.
The family are calling it a miracle Lilliana has survived this far. Her arms and legs were swollen, black and blue, and the hospital didn’t have her blood type for a transfusion.
“We are waiting for a specialist doctor ... to see if the infection has gone down to the muscle. If it’s down to the muscle they must amputate (but) we must get her home.”
A YOUNG Gold Coast family is desperately trying to get their baby girl home from Thailand before her legs are amputated.
Eight-month-old Lilliana Sheridan has been fighting for her life for five days in a Thai hospital after contracting meningococcal caused by septic shock.
The family are calling it a miracle Lilliana has survived. Her arms and legs were swollen, black and blue and the hospital didn’t have her blood type for a transfusion.
Yesterday, Lilliana was in a stable condition inside a Phuket hospital but Thai doctors were concerned about infection on her left leg and a little bit on her right.
As doctors talk of possible amputation, parents Elisha Robinson, 23, and Jai Sheridan, 25, just want to bring their baby back to Australia for a second opinion.
To make it worse, Ms Robinson cannot even hold her baby girl as she has the influenza B virus.
“I still am not able to go anywhere near my baby,” she said. “I can’t even fly with her home.
“We are waiting for a specialist doctor to come, which seems to be taking forever, to see if the infection has gone down to the muscle or if we can skin graft it to save her leg. If it’s down to the muscle they must amputate (but) we must get her home.”
Mr Sheridan said: “We have been in contact the whole time with Lilliana’s GP back home. He said the feet were a perfectly normal colour and there was no reason to amputate the leg.”
Mr Sheridan said the family’s travel insurance covered a flight from Phuket to Bangkok but wouldn’t pay for the medevac to Australia.
“We just want to get her home to the Brisbane Children’s Hospital but the medevac costs $120,000, which is why our friends and family have been trying to raise money.” More than $13,000 was through social media.
However, in a cruel twist last night, the Facebook account was closed and every dollar raised was mistakenly returned to those who donated.
Ms Robinson shut down her Facebook account after abuse from heartless trolls.
“I only deleted my Facebook because it’s all becoming too overwhelming and people were leaving some negative comments,” said Ms Robinson late last night. “They never said it would delete the fundraiser. I felt helpless all over again.”
The family holiday was originally planned for last year but after Ms Robinson fell pregnant it was postponed until this year.
“On Thursday, Lilliana woke up with a bit of a fever but she was happy and smiling so we went for breakfast,” Mr Sheridan said.
When she didn’t shake the fever they took her to Patong Hospital where she was given paracetamol and hydrolytes.
“We left her with Elisha and we went out to get lunch,” he said. “When we came back Elisha was standing in the driveway and Lilli was limp with blue-purple rashes on all of her skin.”
After asking for and being given money, the locals helped the family get an ambulance to Patong Hospital where Lilliana was given oxygen to stabilise her.
“They transferred us to Bangkok Hospital in Phuket,” Mr Sheridan said. “I had to sign all this paperwork and they wanted me to pay a deposit before they looked at her. I paid it and then boom the doctor was there and she went straight to ICU.
“Then they didn’t have O negative blood anywhere in Thailand at that stage and doctors had to give her O positive blood but she just took it.”
Ms Robinson pleaded for help and her social media post was shared more than 1200 times and within a day more than 1000 people had donated blood to Thai Red Cross.