Mum shares sign of “hidden killer” after spotting mark on son’s arm

Tuesday 11 June 2019

A local mum is warning others to look out for a surprising sign of a “hidden killer” after her son had a brush with it following a graze at the zoo.

After local law firm director Alexandra Ruddy spotted what appeared an “innocuous” red mark on the arm of her son, Ewan (8), last week, he was able to be treated for life-threatening sepsis before it was too late.

With Ewan having made a speedy recovery, Alexandra took to Facebook, where she urged others to look out for "tracking" down veins.

The post quickly went viral, having been shared around 36,000 times – and has already led to one woman identifying it in herself, and managing to secure urgent treatment before things worsened.

Pictured: The mark on Ewan's arm.

But Alexandra told Expressshe doesn’t consider herself a “hero”.

She explained that Ewan’s brush with sepsis, which kills thousands yearly in the UK, happened after a trip to the zoo: 

“He was so excited to see the bears that he tore off, and went flying, putting his hands down to stop himself. He took the skin off the palm of his hands… We went and washed it – I had one plaster on me, but it wasn’t really big. 

“When we got home, cleaned it up a bit, tried to keep it clean during the week. But this is a little boy who goes to school and touches everything he sees, so it’s hard.”

Pictured: Alexandra Ruddy and her three children: Ewan, Saskia (12) and Lachlan (13).

It wasn’t until the week that followed that Ewan’s parents realised that something was wrong. 

Before he was due to head to the beach over the weekend, Ewan complained of what appeared to be a rash, which he described as “itchy”. 

When Alexandra took a look, she remembered the advice of a friend, whose own son had contracted sepsis four years ago after he was bitten by a spider.

The tell-tale sign of sepsis was a red mark that appeared to extend the length of his vein – and continued to crawl upwards from the area of his injury.

She quickly went to A&E, which was “packed”, so attended an out-of-hours doctor. 

“I told him that I had tried to put a bit of Fucidin [an ointment] on it, but he said, ‘This has gone way past that. If this tracks any further in the next 48 hours, it’s straight back down to hospital.’”

Fortunately, Ewan was able to be put on antibiotics and recovered quickly – so quickly, in fact, “he was in school on Monday and did a triathlon the following day!”

That’s the “surprising thing”, Alexandra noted – that sepsis can be treated so easily, but only if spotted.

Pictured: Ewan at the zoo.

“It just shows how you must be observant and take note of these small things because actually with sepsis you just don’t know.” 

She therefore decided to spread the message in a Facebook post, which has now received thousands of comments, likes and shares from parents and other people across the UK, and led to her being contacted by the national media. 

While she said she wasn’t excited about the attention – describing it as somewhat of a “circus” – Alexandra said she yielded her initial reluctance to share her family’s story upon realising the important impact it could have. 

“I’ve been contacted by so many people saying they’ve had sepsis… It’s known as the ‘hidden killer’ and not many people know about the red tracking.

“I was contacted by one lady, who said to me that she’d seen my post on Facebook and the night before last was feeling unwell and noticed a red line on her arm so got her straight down to A&E and was put on antibiotics straight away. That lady did make me think twice about my reluctance. She got down there [to hospital] – goodness only knows what would have happened if she hadn’t.”

The key takeaway message for everyone, she says, is to not dismiss small injuries – no matter how small they might seem.

“Tiny cuts and grazes, stings, bites can become something else, so make sure you keep an eye on them because prevention is better!”