A FATHER has told of his nightmare experiences when his baby daughter was badly scalded by boiling water and needed skin graft surgery.

Former Hollywood actor Dominic Colenso, who now runs a York business and lives in Bootham, said Nell had grafts to her neck, shoulder and arm at Pinderfields Hospital, Wakefield, after the freak accident earlier this year, when a cup of black tea was knocked off a side as she was crawling below.

He said Nell, who was just over a year old at the time, was now on her way to 'making a fantastic recovery,' thanks to superb treatment by doctors and nurses,in the Paediatric Burns Unit.

York Press:

Pinderfields Hospital in Wakefield

Dominic, 34, who played Virgil Tracy in the Hollywood film Thunderbirds and had parts in British TV productions such as Midsomer Murders and Doctors before giving up acting, said he and his wife Laura were left with horrific memories of the moment they held Nell in their arms after the operation and they heard the screams of another young child coming from a nearby treatment room.

"This was where the children went to have their dressings changed," he said. "However, based on the sounds that came from behind it's doors, it was more akin to a medieval torture chamber than a place of wellbeing.

"Listening to the noises of that child in such distress led us to conjure all sorts of images in our minds. Nell would need her dressings changed many times over the coming days and the thought of her being in as much distress as the child we could hear was devastating."

York Press:

Dominic's selfie from the Leeds Half Marathon

He said he and his wife had a sleepless night imagining what Nell's trip to the treatment room would bring but thankfully, her first dressing change was much calmer and less painful than the one they had heard.

"However, I was left with a sense that there must be a simple solution to prevent other children and parents experiencing such an anxious wait," he said.

Dominic, who now runs York communications company, In Flow Training, said he raised his concerns with the ward sister.

He discovered staff had requested sound-proof doors for the treatment room but the hospital didn't have the funds, and he decided there and then to help by raising the £4,000 needed to buy simple sound proof doors.

Having already taken part in the Leeds Half Marathon in May, he is now planning to run in the Yorkshire PlusNet Marathon in York on October 11 to raise funds for The Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust Charitable Fund and Paediatric Burns Unit.

Dominic has already raised £1,225, can be sponsored by going to www.justgiving.com/DominicColenso/