A little girl suffered with the ‘worst chicken pox’ her doctors had ever seen – but she was turned away from A&E twice.

Evie-Beth Taylor was just five when she was taken to the doctor with chickenpox.

However, the rash was so extreme that professionals initially told her parents it might be a rare genetic condition – and not chickenpox at all.

The infection was so severe the little girl was left crying in intense discomfort whenever she was touched, making it impossible for mum Lianne Taylor, 33, to clean her airways.

So unwell she couldn’t eat, drink or even use the toilet, Evie-Beth’s nose became so blocked with hardened mucus, leaving her struggling to breathe.

Lianne called paramedics and her daughter was rushed to A&E twice in just two days.

But Lianne claims she was “treated like an overreacting parent” and turned away both times, being told that she had to wait 10 days for the antibiotics prescribed by her GP to take effect.

Desperate, Lianne took her daughter back to the GP once more, who immediately arranged for her to go straight to hospital – where doctors told Lianne she was lucky to have brought her in when she did.

After four days in hospital, Evie-Beth was finally allowed to return home, but it took months for the spots to completely fade.

She has been left with visible marks across her face and body.

A year on, Lianne has decided to share the emotional images of Evie-Beth’s experience to raise awareness of just how serious chickenpox can be.

Lianne, from Newton Aycliffe, County Durham, said: “It was really traumatic seeing Evie-Beth like this.

“She was struggling to breathe because she was so blocked up with mucus that became very hard.

“We couldn’t get near her to wash her or clean it away because she was crying in pain.

“The spots just kept coming and coming. Even when she was in hospital, the doctors were coming in every day and she kept developing more and more spots.

“The doctors said they had never seen chickenpox that severe.

“They had a photographer come in and take photos of her skin because they had never seen a case like hers before. They didn’t know why.”

Mum-of-two Lianne first noticed a spot on her daughter’s arm on 4 February 2017 and thought it could be chickenpox.

When the infection spread all over her body on 8 February, her worried mum and dad Stuart Taylor bathed her in oats and applied creams and chamomile lotions to ease the itching.

But their daughter only got worse.

Lianne started sleeping in the same bed as Evie-Beth so she could wake her up every hour to give her a drink.

Her GP prescribed antibiotics, but when paramedics took Evie-Beth to A&E on 10 February, they turned her away.

It wasn’t until her GP sent Evie-Beth straight to Darlington Memorial Hospital on 13 February that she was finally admitted.

Lianne, who studies history at Teesside University, said: “It was absolutely awful. It was really bad. Being sent away from A&E made me feel like I wasn’t taken seriously as a parent.

“It was overwhelming. It was a really tough time.”

Now happy and healthy, seven-year-old Evie-Beth is still affected by the marks left from her chickenpox.

Lianne said: “She is a happy, lively girl. What upsets me most is that she sometimes says she looks different now and that’s heartbreaking to hear.

“I always tell her she’s beautiful even though she has these marks. She doesn’t have a lot, but there are several on her face.

“I hope they will fade over time.”

A spokesperson for County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust said: “While we cannot comment on individual cases, we always welcome feedback, especially where patients or their families feel they have not received the care they expected.

“We are sorry if this has been the experience in this case.

“We would be happy to discuss the situation further if the family would like to get in touch with our patient experience team.”