During a family Sunday dinner one Father’s Day seven-year-old Day Sarah Pryce began losing co-ordination, unable to speak and unable to see.

The last thing she can remember is missing the plate with her cutlery and stabbing the table.

Her condition continued to deteriorate alarmingly. Her hands assumed unnatural positions. A doctor thought she might have had a brain haemorrhage.

With no time to spare to wait for an ambulance, her parents Dennis and Linda rushed her to the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital from their Crew Green home.

She went into intensive care, her life in serious danger. “It all happened so quickly, from sitting around the dinner table at 1pm, to being on a ventilator at 4pm,” said Dennis.

“At Shrewsbury they didn’t know what it was. It was so frightening and we felt so helpless,” said Linda.

The air ambulance was called to transfer Sarah to Birmingham Children’s Hospital. Sarah’s journey by air took 14 minutes. “It really did save her life,” said Linda.

It was at Birmingham that the problem was diagnosed, and it was related to the fact that Sarah had had a kidney transplant.

“They found that it was a virus which had upset her new kidney,” said Linda.

“It was magnesium deficiency,” said Dennis. “The virus had caused her kidney to dump vast amounts of magnesium out of her system. Magnesium deficiency causes your brain to shut down.”

Sarah, who is now 19, made a complete recovery. But it had been a near thing.

Linda said: “If it had not been for the air ambulance we would not have Sarah now.”

The family have raised about £6,000 for the air ambulance over the years since.

Pictures:
Top: A young Sarah says thanks to the air ambulance crew.
Bottom: Sarah, now 19, with her parents Dennis and Linda.