Claire McCormack, 47, a senior infectious diseases nurse, died just days after first feeling unwell following a barbecue, with her family initially believing she had food poisoning before she rapidly deteriorated
Nurse Claire McCormack was fit and healthy.(Image: Supplied)
A super-fit mum who thought she was suffering from food poisoning died within days after a fatal sepsis infection shut down her organs.
Claire McCormack, 47, a senior staff nurse in infectious diseases at Forth Valley Royal Hospital, rapidly deteriorated after waking up unwell on June 23 last year.
Her devastated daughter, Steph Burgoyne, 20, said the family initially believed Claire had picked up a stomach bug or food poisoning after attending a neighbour’s barbecue just two days earlier.
But within hours of arriving at A&E, Claire had become delirious, her skin had turned purple, and doctors were forced to place her into an induced coma as she suffered multi-organ failure caused by sepsis.
Steph told how her mum – known as “Turbo” by colleagues because of her endless energy – never regained consciousness and died six days later.
Claire with daughter Steph.(Image: Supplied)
She said: “My mum called in sick to work on the Monday morning as she’d been up through the night with a tummy bug and was generally unwell. She had been totally fine the day before, everything was normal.
“She had been to a neighbour’s BBQ on the Saturday, so the only thing we could think was she might have food poisoning.
“I was working from home and kept checking on her, but by 10am she was in severe pain so I called our doctors. They advised me to call the emergency services and in the end I decided to take her to A&E at her own hospital.”
Claire and husband Sandy.(Image: Supplied)
Claire, from Falkirk, was triaged immediately after arriving at hospital and taken for tests, but doctors were unable to identify the cause of her sudden deterioration.
Steph, an apprentice IT consultant, said: “I started calling my gran and stepdad Sandy while they did tests as she was quickly getting worse. We were just racking our brains trying to think if something had happened through the week that could have caused this.”
Within a few hours, medics made the decision to place Claire into an induced coma in intensive care and begin dialysis.
Steph said: “My mum was not reacting to any medication. She went into multi-organ failure and I just couldn’t comprehend when a doctor told me that she could die.
“In the blink of an eye she had gone from having a normal weekend, dancing at a BBQ, to fighting for her life. It made no sense.”
By that evening, doctors suspected sepsis – a life-threatening condition where the body’s immune response to infection begins to damage its own organs.
Despite extensive treatment, Claire’s condition continued to worsen and she died on Sunday, June 29.
Steph said: “They tried so many different meds and treatments but she just didn’t respond. We later found out she didn’t have a spleen, which made it very hard for her to survive.”
Specialists were unable to determine exactly how Claire developed sepsis and believed it was “very unlikely” to have come from her hospital work.
Steph with mum Claire and gran Denise during happier times in New York.(Image: Supplied)
Steph added: “She spent her whole career caring for others and had huge knowledge of sepsis, which makes losing her to it even harder to understand.
“My mum was the life and soul of the party, the liveliest person you could meet. She was fit, she went to the gym.
“It just underlines how sepsis is a silent killer that does not discriminate, no matter your age or health.”
Steph said the family – including stepdad Sandy and gran Denise – are still struggling to process how quickly Claire was taken from them.
Family and friend of Claire recently completed the Kilt Walker in Claire’s memory. They celbrate with her favourite drink Stella.
They are now fundraising for Sepsis Research FEAT in her memory and raising awareness of the condition.
She said: “I’ve now got a life ahead of me of milestones where my mum won’t be there. But the whole family is suffering.
“We’re trying to turn something so horrible into something positive, because that’s what she would have wanted.
“I would plead with anyone reading this to familiarise yourself with the signs of sepsis – recognising them early could genuinely save a life.”
For more information about sepsis and signs of symptoms visit, here.