How model's new heels put her in hospital with life-threatening sepsis condition
WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT: A model is lucky to be alive after she contracted a deadly sepsis infection from a blister caused by a pair of new heels.
Gemma Downey, 23, felt her shoes rubbing against her heels, while she was walking to the train station on her way to a recent appointment.
The part time model from West Sussex, England, noticed her new heels had rubbed and caused a blister on her right heel - and changed into a more comfortable pair of shoes.
But within a days she was being treated in hospital for early onset sepsis - and was warned if she hadn't acted quickly, she could have lost her leg had the infection taken hold.
Now, she is speaking out in a bid to educate others about the dangers of sepsis and to tell people to trust their instincts if something isn't right.
"I thought if it's happened to me, I'd like to warn other people about it,” Ms Downey explained.
“I couldn't believe that something so insignificant could cause so much damage. I am very lucky that my condition was spotted early.”
“I’ve had that so many times, I just didn’t think anything of it- so many times, especially with new shoes.
‘It had a strange colour’
“I'd like to warn other women about it, I want them to know if they do get a blister and feel bad, to trust their instincts and get it checked out.
Ms Downey had donned the espadrilles platforms last week, after buying them in a second hand shop last year and only wore them a handful of times.
But after a few hours she noticed the straps rubbing the back of her feet.
“It started off as my shoes rubbing on the back of my foot, it sort of broke the skin, like a cut,” she said.
“At some point it looked like it was forming a tiny blister- I had a plaster on because I didn’t think it was anything significant but later I did notice it had a strange colour- it went downhill from there.”
Things got pretty bad, pretty quickly.
“My foot had swollen right up and was travelling round my ankle area and the pain was absolutely awful,” she said.
“I just dropped to the floor in agony and that really hurt, it was getting more and more swollen.”
It was then when Gemma decided to get it checked out and went to the doctors, where she was prescribed antibiotics.
However she kept feeling worse so she went to emergency at Worthing Hospital, where the doctors couldn’t find anything concerning.
The next morning she woke up feeling even worse and being sick. She went back the doctors who told her she was showing the early stages of sepsis and needed to go straight to the hospital.
Ms Downey stayed two days at hospital where she was treated for sepsis and cellulitis, a bacterial skin infection, and was discharged on.
“I had pains all over my body, I had chest pains and trouble breathing, I knew something was seriously wrong,” she recalled.
“I know it can be fatal – the doctors told me I was lucky I had acted on it and went to check it out because it could have been more serious. “
Ms Downey says others should be aware of how the popular shoes can produce such a potentially dangerous injury.
“Everyone assumes it was stiletto heels that caused it but the shoes I was wearing are very popular at the moment, they’re in trend, just normal every day shoes.”
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