Standing next to her daughter Paige's tiny body Siobhan Smith desperately whispered in her little girl's ear, begging her to keep clinging on to life.

Doctors frantically performed CPR in front of the distraught mum. "I was crying and crying," Siobhan recalls. "It was so horrible to see her lying there with tubes everywhere and not knowing if she was going to make it.

"It just seemed to go on for ages, I don't know if I was in there for a few minutes or an hour." But just 24 hours after spending Christmas with her family, Paige had two heart attacks and died - during surgery for suspected appendicitis.

Siobhan adds: "Time just stood still. I was standing by her head, whispering to her. I said to her she had to get better because she had all her presents waiting for her back at home. They pumped her chest over and over, but nothing happened. I didn't know when one attempt stopped and another began."

Now, speaking exclusively to the Mirror, Siobhan, 26, says she simply can't understand why her little girl died, especially as she's now been told -twice- that there was nothing wrong with Paige's appendix after all.

The cause of Paige's death is still unknown and Siobhan and her husband, Paige's stepdad, Scott, 25, must now wait for an inquest to find out what happened.

Exhausted

Until then they are clinging to the last happy memories they have of Paige on Christmas morning. Like any other five-year-old, she was excited to rip open her presents from Santa - roller blades, a pink laptop and new dolls. But within a few minutes, poor little Paige was lying on a rug on the living room floor, too exhausted to enjoy her new toys.

The youngster had first fallen ill on December 19, complaining of a headache and stomach pains. As the weekend passed, Paige, from Cramlington, Northumberland, showed no signs of recovery. She had a fever, started to be sick and had diarrhoea. Siobhan says: "Everyone gets sick around that time of year and I thought she'd picked something up from school."

But Paige was still suffering by Monday, so Siobhan took her to the GP, who thought it could be appendicitis and said she needed to be referred to hospital immediately. Paige's family chose the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle because it had a good reputation. Siobhan says: "We were worried, but the doctors didn't seem overly concerned. Appendicitis was not mentioned again, and they said she was dehydrated."

Doctors gave her medicine for the fever, sickness and diarrhoea. But Paige was deteriorating - she looked gaunt and pale. Even when Santa visited, she didn't have the strength to get up and see him. She was in a room by herself, and her mum and Scott kept a vigil at her bedside. "We just didn't know what was wrong with her," Siobhan said. "The doctors said it was a mystery to them. It could have been a virus or a water bug, but they expected it to clear up."

By Christmas Eve, the mystery illness still had a hold of Paige, but she'd perked up a bit. Scott said: "She went for a walk on the ward holding my hand. They said Paige was well enough to come home for Christmas Day and if she wasn't any better by the end of the day, we had to bring her back."

Luckily, Paige got to spend the day with her sister Keira, who is one, and brother Aaron, six. Siobhan said: "I'm pregnant at the moment and my baby is due on February 20. Paige was really excited about getting a little sister - but she said she'd have preferred a brother!"

Christmas Day passed and Paige was looking forward to listening to her new Rihanna CD. Her appetite began to pick up, and she went to visit her grandma Amanda, that evening. Siobhan said: "She got a scooter and a doll from my mam, but she wasn't even well enough to play with it. She just kept saying she wanted cuddles, so I gave her great big hugs all day long. At midnight she started being sick again so I knew we had to get her to the hospital."

When they got there Paige was put on a drip. Siobhan says: "At 8pm they examined her again. That was when they said it was suspected appendicitis and they needed to operate immediately."

Colostomy

"We were worried, but we understood she needed the operation. They told us everything should be fine, but the worst outcome was that she might need a colostomy bag after the operation. So we consented to the operation and she went to have an X-ray. After the X-ray she said: 'Daddy, I'm all fixed now'."

"Then at 8.30pm they started the operation to remove her appendix, and we were left waiting in the parents' room. Every time the door opened, we expected it to be Paige coming back and all better. But an hour and a half later, a nurse came in and told us that Paige had suffered a cardiac arrest. I was so shocked, I asked if she was OK."

At first they had hoped Paige would pull through. Scott says: "We were told she'd had a reaction but we weren't told what to - we thought it would be the general anaesthetic. But the nurse told us they were going to carry on removing her appendix as it was standard practice, although they hadn't found signs of anything wrong with it.

"After we were told that, we just sat there feeling helpless." And Siobhan adds: "It was terrifying to think she'd had a heart attack, but the hospital staff seemed to think everything was going to be fine."

At nearly midnight on Boxing Day, three-and-a-half hours after she went under the knife, Siobhan and Scott were called in again. It was more devastating news - Paige had suffered another heart attack. Paige lost her fight for life on the operating table. But the fact that her appendix was healthy makes it even harder for her family to bear.

Siobhan says: "When the coroner told us there was nothing wrong with her appendix, I just felt angry. We feel like Paige died for nothing. How can someone be allowed to have surgery for a 'suspected' illness? Why can't they be 100 per cent sure?"

"I won't be having my baby at the RVI because there are too many bad memories."

"Paige would have loved her new little sister and it's broken our hearts having to tell Aaron what's happened. We told him Paige was in the sky, and that she's an angel." Heartbreakingly, Paige had played an angel in her school nativity a week before she fell ill.

Siobhan said: "Paige loved getting dressed up in girlie clothes and liked make-up. She was full of life and was a lovely little girl. Paige and Aaron were more like twins than brother and sister, they followed each other everywhere. "They were in the same class at school and were always playing together."

Siobhan adds: "It breaks our hearts because the other day Aaron asked me: 'Is it OK if I move out of town?' "I asked him what he meant and he said that he wanted to go to the sky to visit Paige. He says when he is older he wants to learn to fly an aeroplane so he can see his sister in the sky."

Paige's funeral was held only last week and Siobhan adds: "The other day we took the children to release balloons at the beach in her memory and the kids at her primary school have been doing drawings of Paige to go in a book of memories."

Questions

Siobhan says: "We don't want anyone to go through the same as we have - you put your trust in doctors, nurses and surgeons because you think they know best. But they don't always, and you should question them if you think something is wrong."

Now it's the last day the couple spent with Paige that will stay with them. Siobhan says: "When we came back we took all her Christmas presents she hadn't played with to her room and just wept. Then we laughed, remembering all the happy times. It really helped. We'll miss everything about her."

A Newcastle Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust spokesman said: "It would be inappropriate to comment on the medical and related detail until the findings of the coroner's inquest are known. Having said this, the family have yet to express any concerns or grievances directly to the trust. If they choose to do so, we shall explain further the prevailing circumstances of what was a lifethreatening condition of such uncertainty, which necessitated exploratory surgery. An assurance can be given that the specialist involved did act professionally and appropriately. To have done otherwise would have been most negligent."

Source: Daily Mirror

Pic: duchesssa