Mum’s heartbreak as son, three, looks like he’s ‘been in a house fire’ after a rare allergy to antibiotics

A LITTLE boy was left “looking like a burns victim” after suffering a rare allergic reaction to the antibiotics he was given for an ear infection.
Three-year-old Kai Kehm's skin peeled off just days after he started taking the medication – leaving him looking red raw.

The tot broke out in blisters so severe that he was left critically ill and pout into intensive care.
He was in hospital for a whopping four weeks and underwent treatment to remove layers of his skin, just like burns victims have done.
His worried mum Julie, 42, from Houston, Texas, USA, said Kai, now seven, looked like he had been burnt in a house fire.

Releasing shocking pictures of her son's condition, the mum-of-four said: "Skin started peeling off his face, coming off in sheets, and his eyes were sealed shut.
"Our poor little boy looked like a burns victim, like he'd been in a really bad house fire.
"It was so heart-breaking to see him like that."
It turned out Kai was suffering with Stevens-Johnson syndrome - a rare reaction to a medication, thought to effect just one in a million people.

"He'd lost a top layer of skin and was in agonising pain," Julie said.
"They sedated Kai and put him in an induced coma for 10 days to help him deal with the pain while they treated him.
"It was an agonising time."
Kai was born with Down's Syndrome in November 2008 and as a tot suffered with heart problems, which are common with the condition.
Julie, who fell pregnant just months after meeting Kai's dad, aged 34, – her now-husband Cameron Kehm, then 37, said: "Kai's arrival was a surprise, but we were really excited to have a baby together.
"We were surprised at 18 weeks when we learnt our baby had Down's Syndrome and three weeks later that he had a heart defect, but we were looking forward to his arrival."

Julie, who worked as a respiratory therapist in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Texas Children's Hospital and the Woman's Hospital of Texas, before stopping to care for her children, said that both she and her partner felt prepared for the challenges they knew would face them.
"I grew up with a step uncle with Down's Syndrome so I knew a little about it. We did mourn a child we thought we had. But we created new dreams, did some research and didn't feel daunted by what lay ahead of us."

At three, Kai was back in Texas Children's Hospital with fluid in his ears, which doctors discovered was MRSA - a superbug which is resistant to most antibiotics.
Kai was prescribed an antibiotic called sulfamethoxazole – but 10 days into treatment he became incredibly unwell.
He was covered in a rash from head-to-toe and his eyes were extremely swollen.
Doctors thought it was an allergic reaction at first and gave him an antihistamine, but 12 hours later Kai was rocking himself backwards and forwards in pain and was rushed to A&E.
A few hours later, Kai couldn't even open his eyes, his mouth was blistered and he was screaming in pain.

It was then that he was diagnosed with Stevens-Johnson Syndrome.
Every two days doctors had to perform the painful procedure of removing layers of his skin which were horrendously affected by the reaction.
Thankfully, 12 days after fist being admitted, the reaction subsided.
But now Kai's parents live in constant fear that any medication could cause a flare up.
"I've heard it feels like your body is burning from the inside out. I can't even imagine how he felt," Julie said.

Doctors told Julie and Cameron, also parents to Peter, nine, Lilah, six, and Calum, two, they believed it was the ingredient sulfamethoxazolem, an antibiotic, which caused the extreme reaction.
Both parents now read the ingredients list on medication religiously, as a precaution.
"Although Kai hasn't had as bad a reaction since 2012, we know it could happen at any time," Julie disclosed. "We have to be so careful with what tablets we give him."

After Kai was released from hospital on July 2, 2012, Julie was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) because of the disturbing memories she has of her son.
Miraculously, the little lad walked away from the terrible situation without a single scar, although he has been diagnosed with toxic epidermal necrolysis, a progression of the same life-threatening skin disease, and is now a happy youngster.

But because his Down's Syndrome means he does not speak yet, Julie doesn't know if her boy remembers the terrible month he went through.
"He survived. Kai is a little fighter and I know that," she added.
For support visit: www.sjsupport.org