‘Her lips were starting to dry out’: How a nine-year-old girl went from ‘flu’ symptoms to a horrific rare disease that started eating away at her skin

WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT

Valencia Davies, nine, has a one-in-a-million, potentially fatal skin disease that started out like a flu and was caused by a common medication.

The New Zealand girl is battling Stevens Johnson Syndrome, a painful skin disease affecting the skin which kills one in 10 affected by it.

It’s caused by taking one of at least 200 medications including common paracetamol and penicillin and for Valencia, it developed from flu-like symptoms to a rash and blisters and sores on her face and in her mouth.

Valencia Davies, nine, pictured with some of the horrific lesions caused by the potentially fatal Steven Johnson Syndrome which she is battling in hospital

Two days later she was given medication for a viral chest infection.

But by Friday she was so concern she took Valencia to the Rotorua Hospital emergency department.

While waiting, she received antibiotics – it was thought she had chicken pox.

Then it got worse.

She soon had lesions covering her body, dry, yellow, pus-covered lip and she was vomiting and having seizures, The Rotorua Daily Post reported.

‘Her lips were starting to dry out, they started going yellow, they looked infected and swollen and there was a pussy stream in them, her eyes started going red and blood shot,’ her mother said.

‘It just broke my heart … yeah I thought she was going to die. I was thinking that but I was trying not to.’

A young Valencia pictured in happier times before contracting Steven Johnson Syndrome

After being quarantined, she was transferred to another hospital for treatment with lesions over 60 per cent of her body.

She spent two weeks in the Waikato Hospital fighting the disease and despite returning to the Rotorua Hospital, isn’t in the clear yet.

Valencia still requires oxygen at all times to breath, is fed through a tube and has a catheter.

She still has a chance of infection.

Heavily sedated and on antibiotics, she’s being constantly watched by doctors.

It’s not clear how long it will be until she has recovered.

To make matters worse, her father’s job was recently made redundant and her mother has used up all of her sick leave and holidays to be with her in hospital.

The family – Valencia has four siblings – had move out of their rental home because it was being sold.

Despite the hardships the family is facing, there is some good news.

Their community has rallied around them, with Mrs Mikaere’s workplace, a supermarket, providing food and the Salvation Army, support.

Her mother, who lives in Australia, flew home to help out the family.

There’s also to be a fundraising day being held at Valencia’s primary school to help out the family, and a Go Fund Me page has raised her family almost $10,000.

Some of the horrific sores and lesions which at one point dotted 60 per cent of Valencia’s body

Akademi Portal

Source: www.gofundme.com…

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