Sunshine Coast Life Flight saves Yarren after severe anaphylactic reaction to hairy caterpillars
For a Queensland boy, mere seconds was the difference between life or death when he encountered a common hairy caterpillar and had a severe anaphylactic reaction.
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For a Queensland boy mere seconds could have been the difference between life or death when he encountered a common hairy caterpillar playing in the park and had a severe anaphylactic reaction.
Six-year-old Pomona boy Yarren was at the Noosa Heads Lions Park with friends and family in June 2023 climbing trees with his mates when he passed out with a terrible rash.
His dad Gregg said Yarren ran over to his mother Rachael and told her he was ‘seeing rainbows’ before he vomited and collapsed in her arms.
“Yarren was unable to speak coherently to me. He was speaking in gibberish,” his mother said.
“So, we walked, carried him then from where we were over to the entrance of the park to wait for the ambulance. And in that time from the first phone call to the second phone call, he started having seizures.
“He bit his tongue and blood was pouring out. So, of course, it doesn’t look like that. It just looks like oh my gosh, he’s spitting out blood, and he had this rash that appeared on his stomach, and it came all the way up to his throat.”
Yarren had seven seizures before the Queensland Ambulance Service paramedics arrived.
QAS rushed him to Noosa Private Hospital where doctors intubated Yarren and put him into an induced coma.
The Sunshine Coast LifeFlight aeromedical team, including aircrew officer Ryan Cross and critical care doctor Hamish Brown continued his medical care flying him to Sunshine Coast University Hospital.
Three in four LifeFlight missions are inter-hospital transfers.
“There’s nothing worse when something like that happens to one of your kids,” his father Gregg said.
“Your mind runs 100 miles an hour. Your heart’s running 100 miles an hour … it’s 100 per cent panic and adrenaline. And the worst part is not knowing what just happened.
“The LifeFlight crew arrived to fly Yarren to SCUH where there was a pediatric team waiting for him. And they were very methodical and calm. But my mind wasn’t … because my little boy’s laying there in an induced coma by now and we don’t have a clue what’s going on.”
In an emotional reunion at the LifeFlight Sunshine Coast hangar, Dr Brown explained to Yarren and his family why it was so important that he was flown.
“You were very, very unwell,” Dr Brown said to little Yarren.
“The 12-minute flight compared to the 45-minute trip by road was necessary because we didn’t really know why you were so critically unwell.
“You were unconscious, you had a rash, your oxygen levels were low, you weren’t breathing properly and your airways were compromised.
“Being inside the LifeFlight helicopter meant that you never left the intensive care unit environment.
“You were in that ICU bubble the entire time and we didn’t take our eyes off you during the flight.”
His father Gregg filmed the LifeFlight helicopter as it took off and was talking to his son as the chopper flew away because he thought he may not see his son again.
“I took a video of Yarren getting on the flight with his mumma and taking off and to be honest, that was raw emotion,” Gregg said.
“I was saying goodbye to him too, because my boy couldn’t breathe. As I started to talk to Yarren in that helicopter, I started to break down.”
“I love you Yarren,” Greg can be heard saying on the video.
“I love you little guy. I will see you soon.
“Love you beautiful.”
Rachael said she only realised the seriousness of her son’s medical emergency weeks later.
“When you step back and you’ve got time to think about it, that’s when it hits you,” she said.
“When you realise that getting a helicopter to hospital is actually serious and it’s not a normal thing.”
“That’s when you go ‘you know what? I think my son’s life was on the line’.
“Without LifeFlight, I don’t think Yarren would be alive. I don’t think he would have got to the hospital in time.”
Dr Brown said reactions to hairy caterpillars were common, but usually limited to local reactions like rash, redness, itch and mild swelling.
“Anaphylaxis with some significant and severe systemic involvement is very rare. Yarren is the only child I have encountered clinically in 14 years working as a doctor to have suffered such a reaction,” he said.
Yarren has recovered well, and the family now carry an Epi-Pen everywhere they go.
At an emotional reunion at the LifeFlight Sunshine Coast base, he gave his rescue crew thank you chocolates and gifted critical care doctor Hamish Brown a colourful helicopter picture.
“It was pretty cool that I could go to the base and see the helicopter and the people who saved me,” Yarren said.
When asked what happened the brave six-year-old recounted the scary events from his perspective.
“I just saw rainbows in my eyes. And that’s all I saw,” he said.
“I don’t really know how it happened, but they just started appearing. And it wasn’t after raining so I don’t actually know how they appeared.
“All I remember was that I was playing soccer, and I was climbing the tree then I went to my mum and I don’t remember throwing up.
“It just made me feel like a little whoosey. It just made me feel like weird.
“I saw a video of me taking off, I just can’t remember.”
The Pomona family will be special guests at the upcoming LifeFlight Gala at the Novotel Sunshine Coast Resort on Saturday March 29.
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Originally published as Sunshine Coast Life Flight saves Yarren after severe anaphylactic reaction to hairy caterpillars
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