A mother from near Selby died from an E-coli infection after being wrongly diagnosed by two locum doctors, an inquest heard. Paula Curtis, 34, who was the landlady of the Horse and Jockey pub in Eggborough, was first told she had pulled a muscle, then that she had pleurisy, before dying just days later from the killer infection.

Miss Curtis, who had two young daughters, Shauna, three, and Nicole, 18 months, was taken ill with chest pains in November and a doctor diagnosed a pulled muscle and prescribed painkillers.

The pains continued, and two days later a second doctor diagnosed Miss Curtis as having pleurisy.

But her condition continued to deteriorate, and she was taken to Pontefract General Infirmary where she died from an E-coli infection triggered by pneumonia.

The inquest, held in Wakefield, was told that Miss Curtis died as the result of a severe chest infection, caused by the flu virus which swept the country last year. The flu lowered her body's defences to the E-coli bacteria, and she died of septicaemia on November 25.

Her partner and the father of her children, Matthew Lake, told the inquest that as she became increasingly ill, she began to complain that her feet were so cold that she used a hair-dryer to try to warm them.

She soon collapsed, and he called for an ambulance. By the time the ambulance arrived her lips and lower legs had turned blue.

She was taken to Pontefract General Infirmary, where she died the next morning.

Coroner David Hinchcliff recorded a verdict of death by natural causes.

A former colleague at the Horse and Jockey said that Miss Curtis' partner Matthew Lake and their children had gone abroad for a week after reliving the trauma of her death at Monday's inquest.

"They have gone to get away from it all because it was obviously very upsetting for them," he said.

He added that the couple's young daughters were facing up well to the loss of their mother. "I think they have started to get used to it now, but it was very hard work for them at first."

Customers at the Horse and Jockey were also devastated by the death of their landlady, who also lived above the pub. "Everyone here took it pretty badly at first, because of course it was not a very nice thing to happen to her."

Mr Lake is taking legal advice over whether to sue the doctors.

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