Scottie Kern first noticed his baby son Cailan was unwell on a family holiday to Switzerland. He had been restless and irritable while travelling home and Scottie had assumed he was suffering from teething pain. By the evening, Cailan was still not himself and had developed a fever so Scottie tried to lower his temperature with paracetamol and fluids. The next morning Cailan seemed reasonably well but his temperature was still high.

That evening, however, Cailan’s condition worsened. Increasingly worried, Scottie and his wife decided to seek medical advice.    
Cailan was examined by a triage nurse at the local GP surgery and was sent home with a suspected stomach bug and advice to rehydrate, only to be called back into the surgery that afternoon to see a GP for a second opinion. After assessing Cailan, the GP advised Scottie he was considering sending Cailan to hospital, but wanted to wait 24 hours. The GP asked Scottie to take Cailan home and return the next day for Cailan to be re-assessed.

That evening Cailan’s condition deteriorated rapidly. Scottie, now extremely worried by seeing his son so unwell, took Cailan directly to the local hospital’s 24-hour nurse-led unit. Only subsequently did Scottie find out Cailan had been having minor seizures throughout the night.
A GP who happened to be on the unit that night was able to see Cailan and  admitted him to the accident and emergency unit with suspected gastroenteritis, treating Cailan with fluids to lower his temperature.

Initially the fluids seemed to work and Cailan’s condition improved. However, shortly after being administered antibiotics Cailan suffered a severe seizure. Unable to stop him seizing, doctors put Cailan into an induced coma. While they were attempting to introduce a respiratory line to assist his breathing, Cailan suffered a cardiac arrest and sadly died at around 3.30am on Wednesday morning, just three days after he had become ill. Cailan’s illness, and subsequent death, was due to a type of meningitis caused by a bacterium called Streptococcus pneumoniae. This is known as pneumococcal meningitis.

Commenting on his son’s death Scottie says, ‘We can’t believe the veracity of the disease, the pace at which it can end a young life.  We never want to meet anyone that’s gone through what my wife and I have gone through.’