Devastated parents will sue NHS over child deaths Quickly, his condition began to deteriorate, yet staff ignored alarm monitors, or turned their levels down, so they were less likely to go off, according to the boy's parents Steve and Yolanda Turner, pictured. Mrs Turner said: "Over the next four days he got worse and worse. He was struggling to breathe, was constantly vomiting, and his heart rate shot up to 170 beats per minute. He was losing a lot of fluid and was severely dehydrated. His alarms kept going off but the nurses didn't seem to be monitoring him. When they did come they just changed the levels on the monitoring system. We were pleading with staff to take him back to the intensive care unit because we could see he was in a really bad way. She added that one of the tubes delivering his medication, was not changed for 18 days, despite it being dirty and infected. Mrs Turner, 44, from Warminster, Wilts, said: "We felt completely helpless. He was crying out 'Mummy, I don't like the pain" and 'When can I go home?" and I couldn't do anything to help him." After three weeks in hospital, Sean suffered a cardiac arrest. He was resuscitated, and survived four more weeks but began suffering from blood clots, and then a brain haemorrhage. Even then, his parents say it was four hours before he was taken for a brain scan, which found extensive bleeding to his brain. Mr and Mrs Turner were told then that there was nothing more doctors could do. In a review of Sean's death, the hospital admitted to several failings which may have contributed to his death, including a failure by staff to recognise that he was deteriorating before he had a cardiac arrest. Luke Jenkins was seven when he underwent surgery to correct a heart defect last March. The operation at Bristol Children's Hospital appeared to go well and doctors expected him to make a full recovery, but just over a week later he was dead. Bed shortages had meant the little boy was moved out of intensive care within 24 hours and he was placed into a ward with fewer nurses, some of whom were not specialists in children's cardiac care. Luke's condition deteriorated after being moved as he began losing large amounts of blood and suffering chest pains. His parents, Stephen Jenkins, 31, and Faye Valentine, 27, from Cardiff, said they pleaded for help for their child in a ward that seemed desperately short-staffed. Mr Jenkins said: "We could see that Luke was getting worse, that he was dying. We were screaming and shouting for help, but there were never any nurses around to take proper care of him, and when they were there they wouldn't listen to us. Although alarms on the monitoring equipment were frequently triggered - indicating Luke's worsening condition - his parents saw nurses resetting them, lowering the thresholds so that they did not go off. On Good Friday, less than seven days after his operation, Luke suffered a cardiac arrest. Junior nursing and medical staff did not know where to find resuscitation equipment, how to use it, or which senior staff to call, an investigation by the hospital trust later found. It took 19 minutes for a duty surgeon to attend to Luke and attempt resuscitation. When his chest was opened, a large amount of blood was found in the chest cavity, as well as clots. He died three days later after his parents took the heartbreaking decision to switch off his life support. The investigation that followed Luke's death found his cardiac arrest might have been predicted - and prevented - if staff had acted on warning signs. It also found that the failure of nurses to alert senior medical staff to concerns about his condition might have contributed to his death. Mr Jenkins said: "What it boils down to is that Luke is not here any more because of the way he was cared for at the hospital. That is truly devastating for us. The hospital's report into Luke's death found that "low and unsafe" staffing levels had been identified on the ward 18 months earlier, and had been cited in eight safety incidents in the previous five months. JACK CASEY, 10 months old, survived When Rachel Puaca's 10-month-old son was admitted to hospital for heart surgery she was understandably anxious. Yet even the fears of a new mother could not have prepared her for the squalid conditions in which her son Jack would be treated or the harm he would suffer. Jack entered Bristol Children's Hospital for corrective surgery in March 2010 to treat a congenital heart defect, but while recovering he began to have difficulties breathing and fluid built up in his chest. As surgeons tried to extract the fluid, they pierced the lining of the boy's lungs. Miss Puaca, 25, said: "At that point he was so bad that doctors advised us to say our goodbyes to Jack." Then Jack was airlifted to Great Ormond Street Hospital, in London. Miss Puaca said nurses there noted that her son was a "typical Bristol child" as he had been overly sedated. Remarkably, her son began to recover but returned to Bristol where, Miss Puaca said, Jack was left in dirty nappies and covered in vomit. "I was utterly shocked by the standards of care in intensive care," she said. I had been used to other hospitals so I knew something was seriously wrong. On two occasions she found Jack at risk of choking because staff had not cleared vomit from his airways and the heavily sedated child was unable to move his head. Miss Puaca and her partner Chris, 29, from Bridgend, South Wales, begged nurses to take better care of their son. Miss Puaca said she was left to do almost all of the care of her son because nurses were so scarce on the children's cardiac ward. "I was changing his nappy, inserting his food into the tube, checking his oxygen levels, and administering his medication," she said. Finally, after pleading from his parents, the child was transferred to Cardiff Hospital's cardiac unit. Jack now suffers from developmental problems, including speech and language difficulties and growth deficiencies. Despite being almost four, his growth has been so restricted that he wears clothes for toddlers aged 12 to 18 months. Miss Puaca said: "Jack is a remarkable little boy, he's a happy child and he brings us so much joy, but he has been through so much, and he suffered so much damage. I would never take him back to the hospital in Bristol - but for a miracle he would have died from what they did.