DISTRAUGHT parents Simon Carr and Debbie Martin have joined the world-wide quest for a cure for the brain condition which claimed the life of their eight-day-old daughter.

The couple struggled to fight back the tears as they took the heart-breaking decision to turn off their daughter's life-support machine.

Baby Megan Kate had baffled doctors at Queen's Park Hospital. She suffered from a brain condition so rare that it does not even have a name.

But Simon and Debbie, who run the Wellington pub in Livesey Branch Road, Blackburn, have vowed that Megan's death and her short life of eight days will not be in vain.

Now the couple plan to join an Internet campaign spanning the globe to find out more about the illness. Debbie, 21, said: "The beginning of my pregnancy was terrible and I had three miscarriage scares.

"But after that things settled down, until three weeks before I was due to give birth.

"I fell terribly ill and was rushed into hospital. The doctors had to perform an emergency ceasarian section as they said my illness was the baby's way of telling us she had to be born straight away."

But when Simon, 22 arrived at the hospital Debbie was still under anaesthetic and he was told that his newborn daughter had only a 50 per cent chance of survival. He said: "The doctor told me that he hadn't seen a case like Megan's in his whole career. She seemed to mystify the doctors and nurses." But finally after tests the couple were told Megan had little chance of survival and if she did live then she would probably spend the rest of her days in hospital.

Simon said: "We knew we had to turn off her life-support machine and give her the chance to live on her own.

"She battled for a day and a half before she died but we know we made the right decision.

"There is a mother in Australia who has a four-year-old child still on a life-support machine suffering from the same condition as Megan.

"She has launched a search for information on the Internet and we are going to get in touch with her and tell her about Megan and our experiences.

"Hopefully Megan's life and death will help doctors to find out more about this type of brain damage.

"The doctors and nurses at Queen's Park Hospital were fantastic and have really helped us through this difficult time."

Megan's funeral was due to take place today at Pleasington Crematorium Chapel.

Simon and Debbie have requested that donations be sent in lieu of flowers to the Neo-Natal Intensive Care Unit at Queen's Park Hospital.

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