A two-month-old baby who was in residential care in Donegal died a very rare sudden death.
Coroner John Canon
The baby boy was in care with his mother at Bentley House in Convoy when he died in March 2011.
Letterkenny Coroner’s Court heard that he died due to inhalation of gastric contents.
Pathologist Dr. Catriona Dillon told the inquest the cause of death was not very common and it was the first case that she had come across.
A post mortem carried out by state pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy found that there was no evidence of neglect, injury, asphyxiation or smothering. Sudden Infant Death Syndrome was also ruled out by Dr Cassidy. The inquest heard the baby had been healthy other than suffering from jaundice.
The baby and his mother were brought to the centre from outside the county a week after he was born.
Clutching a blue soft toy as she gave evidence, the boy’s mother said they had both settled very well at Bentley House although her son had suffered jaundice which had required six visits to Letterkenny General Hospital.
The day before he died the baby had been unwell but the following day he was back to himself and was in great form, she said.
They went on a shopping trip to Letterkenny with another resident of the centre and returned at lunchtime. She said her son was happy and smiling but by 6pm he was agitated because of teething, for which she gave him Calgel. The baby was asleep in a car seat when she went to have a shower. She went to wake him after 8.00pm because he was overdue a feed but he would not wake and she found him cold. She ran to her friends in a neighbouring apartment and raised the alarm. Staff carried out CPR on the baby for around 15 minutes before paramedics arrived. CPR continued on the way to Letterkenny General Hospital but the baby was pronounced dead after arrival.
The baby’s mother said her son had been laughing and playing in the hours before her death and “had been doing brilliant”.
The mother and her son had six weeks left in the residential centre and she had been due to have a meeting the next day about where they were going to live after they left. “Never did I think that I would be planning my son’s funeral,” she said.