Teenager died 'hours after paramedics sent him back to bed'
The devastated father of a teenage boy who died at home on his seventeenth birthday just hours after paramedics gave him the all-clear has called for an urgent system overhaul.
Ambulance Victoria is investigating the death of Caleb Pearson, who died last week at his mother's Melbourne home on the day he should have been celebrating turning 17 after paramedics declared he did not require hospital treatment and was sent back to bed.
Caleb's mother, Debra, said her son was a fit and healthy teenager until he started to feel unwell a fortnight ago.
He had complained of a sore throat and saw his GP who prescribed him antibiotics.
"He was complaining he couldn't taste anything," she said in a letter to Fairfax Radio.
"On the evening of Friday May 22, he started suffering from a sore throat and was vomiting as a result of his gagging reflux (there was no pain associated with this). His throat continued to be sore through the weekend and Sunday evening his tongue was white with a fuzz on top."
A couple of days later, Caleb seemed to be on the mend but his condition suddenly and rapidly deteriorated, prompting his worried mother to call an ambulance.
"On my way home I received a message from Bryce (her other son) saying I should get home as Caleb couldn't move. When I arrived home I found him on my bed looking ashen, he said he couldn't move his legs and they appeared splotchy and off colour."
Paramedics allegedly told Caleb he had a virus and should go to bed, not to hospital.
"I told them I had been on my way to emergency. They looked at me as if I was overreacting," his mother continued.
"'Why?' they asked. I said he was extremely pale and hadn't kept anything down since Friday and I was very concerned that he was severely dehydrated.
"They told me he was suffering from a virus there wasn't much the hospital could do to help him.
"I felt belittled and, once I mentioned that Caleb suffered from anxiety, they were treating it as if he was just having some sort of episode."
Early the next morning, Caleb's condition had considerably worsened. His breathing was erratic, his skin cold to the touch, and his eyes glassy and vacant, his mother said.
As she dialled Triple 0 for a second time, Caleb stopped breathing.
Firefighters and paramedics carried out CPR, but Caleb could not be revived.
Caleb's father, Karl Pearson, says his son's death could have easily been prevented.
"If he had've gone to hospital, everything could've been done," he said.
"They said there's nothing the hospital can do, it's just a virus."
He wants urgent changes to procedures so that paramedics take parents' concerns more seriously.
"I'd say to them (paramedics), 'take the mother seriously next time'. He couldn't stand up, he couldn't walk, so there's go to be something there."
The family is now grieving at a time when they should be celebrating Caleb's milestone.
"When she closes her eyes, she can't sleep. She has that picture of him passed away in her bed," Mr Pearson said.
The paramedics involved are too said to be devastated by the tragedy.
"They're quite devastated by it. They've gone there doing the best they can and they never foresaw this. No one did," Ambulance Victoria's acting chief executive Tony Walker told reporters on Thursday.
Mr Walker would not comment on whether the paramedics made a mistake by not taking the teenager to hospital.
"They applied, in their mind, the best judgment they could in making a clinical decision and I don't want to second guess that," he said.
"They're quite devastated by it. They've gone there doing the best they can and they never foresaw this. No one did," acting chief executive Tony Walker told reporters on Thursday.
Ambulance Victoria will wait for the coroner's report into Caleb's death before completing their internal review.
"If there are mistakes made - I'm not saying there was in this case - we can learn from that," Mr Walker said.
The organisation has expressed its condolences to the victim's family, and are including them in the review process.
Morning news break – June 03
