A MUM has praised staff at Furness General Hospital after she gave birth prematurely.

Katy Leech, 21 gave birth to her baby boy Beau Mark Colson O’Brien via an emergency C-section at FGH after going into labour eight weeks early.

Miss Leech said: “All the staff were absolutely brilliant, but I want to say a special thank you to Frankie, the midwife who was with me every step of the way.

“She was amazing, continually checking on me, keeping me calm and she even took the first pictures of me and Beau as I was on my own straight after the birth.

“Everything happened so fast and my mum was looking after my daughter so it was a bit of a whirlwind.”

Baby Beau is a new little brother for Katy’s daughter, Summer. Miss Leech’s emergency labour came shortly after she visited the hospital due to feeling unwell.

Katy said: “I started to feel ill so I went to the maternity ward and the staff were brilliant.

“They took scans and we found out the baby’s heart rate was dangerously high. The staff monitored me with the hope that the baby’s heart rate would come down after being administered with heart deceleration medication.

“When it didn’t, they made the decision to take me in for the emergency caesarean as at that point I was at a very high risk of giving birth prematurely.”

Katy then underwent the complex emergency C-section. She said: “It was so scary, but the staff did amazingly, helping in any way they could. It was a big shock to be told I was going into theatre there and then, but they took excellent care of me.”

Beau is currently being monitored in the special care baby unit and Katy is making daily trips to visit until he can come home.

She said: “He’s doing really well but he is still being monitored until he is strong enough to come home.

“We can’t wait to have him back at home and he’s making great progress so we’re hopeful it will be sometime soon.

"I just want to say thank you again to all the wonderful staff who helped me."