A baby girl died aged just 16 days old, and doctors have no idea why - an inquest has heard. Ryla-Rae Kenny was was found unresponsive in her Moses basket on January 5 this year.
Mum Ruth Mellor had just got up and thought her baby was still sleeping, before she started breakfast.
Ryla-Rae was found to be a ‘funny colour and freezing cold’ just before 8.30am. She had had her last feed and nappy change at around 5am.
The inquest heard Ryla-Rae arrived on December 12, 2022, at six pounds, eight ounces. She was behaving normally during her first weeks of life - feeding and sleeping well, reports MEN.
The court heard that on the morning of January 5, when Ryla-Rae was 16 days old, mum Ruth made the sad discovery. The couple called the emergency services and started trying to resuscitate their baby.
Paramedics continued as Ryla-Rae was rushed from her home to hospital. Doctors put the baby on a ventilator and gave her more adrenaline as they tried to save her life.
But there were no signs of life and the baby was pronounced dead at 9.25am. All investigations carried out by consultant paediatric pathologist Dr Heather Keir came back without answers as to why Ryla-Rae had died - the doctor saying she had ‘no significant findings at all’.
There were no accidental or non-accidental injuries, toxicology reports came back as negative. Dr Keir said there were no signs of any serious infection.
Greater Manchester Police ruled out any suspicions. Dr Keir told the court that Ryla-Rae’s death could be the result of an underlying cause that cannot be detected. She explained: “There might have been issues such as arrhythmias that don’t show up or that there aren’t tests for yet.
“It might have been a different cause but we might just not have a way to diagnose yet.”
The pathologist said she was unable to find any unnatural cause of death, giving her formal cause of death as unascertained.
Assistant coroner Stephen Teasdale recorded a narrative conclusion of Ryla-Rae’s death coming ‘as a consequence of unascertained but natural causes’.
“Babies unfortunately can die of things that we don’t know about,” he added.
