A DISTRAUGHT couple today claimed medical staff failed to detect a rare heart condition which led to the death of their son just 12 days after his birth.

Anthony Holt and his partner, Anna Kellett, say they would never have gone ahead with the pregnancy if they had known baby Aaron had the condition.

They are now considering legal action against the health trust because they claim the heart problem should have been detected by staff at Queen's Park Hospital in the early stage of pregnancy.

Anna, of Holmbrook Close, Blackburn, said: "If they had detected it I would never have had him. He would have been spared all this pain.

"I had four scans - they are supposed to detect things like this."

Aaron, who was the couple's seventh child, suffered from Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome, a complex condition resulting in only the right hand side of the heart working.

It affects about 1 in 5000 children and doctors do not know what causes it. He was born weighing 6lbs 8ozs at Queen's Park Hospital following a two-hour Caesarean delivery and was later transferred to Alder Hey Children's Hospital, Liverpool, to a specialist unit. Aaron died on Saturday.

Problems were first noticed just two hours after Anna was told by a nurse in Blackburn that she had given birth to a healthy child.

Security officer Anthony, 31, said: "I was given him to hold and when I unwrapped his blanket his body was blue and purple. I showed the nurse because I knew there was definitely something wrong.

"He was rushed to the intensive care unit. They should have noticed something before then. I'm no doctor but I knew something was wrong."

Nine hours later, Aaron was transferred to the Liverpool Hospital where staff worked for the next few days to stabilise him before operating.

Anthony said staff at the hospital expressed surprise that the couple had not known their son was suffering from the condition. He explained: "The consultant said it should have been detected in the early stages. He told me most women terminate the pregnancy when they know about the condition.

"We want action taken just to stop anyone else having to go through this pain."

Aaron underwent a nine-hour complex heart operation to try to improve the flow of blood around his body. It is a high-risk procedure and children often die at this stage.

It was the first stage of three operations and only about 50 per cent of children who undergo surgery survive all three stages.

His 29-year-old mother said: "There is no way he could have lived without having the operation. We had to give him that chance. He died four days later. They said he had done really well to survive that long - he just gave up."

Mr John Thomas, chief executive of Blackburn Hyndburn and Ribble Valley NHS Trust, said he would be launching an investigation.

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