‘Dad, Dad it’s not working’: Tragic last words of asthmatic boy as his father battled to save him

He used a vacuum cleaner nozzle to clear the ten-year-old’s airways after he began gasping for breath during an asthma attack

Little angel: Harry Cuming
A dad battled in vain to save his asthmatic son after a paramedic broke down in tears because she couldn’t insert a breathing tube.

Dwayne Cuming, 39, desperately used a vacuum cleaner nozzle to clear Harry’s airways after he began gasping for breath during an asthma attack.

In a statement read at the ten-year-old’s inquest, Mr Cuming said: “He was leant against the living room wall stamping his foot and said, ‘Dad, Dad it’s not working’.

“Harry’s lips were turning blue, I took hold of him, he collapsed, I put him on the floor, at this point he had stopped breathing.”

His dad, a trained first aider, began CPR as paramedics arrived – but they were unable to insert the tube into Harry’s throat.

Mr Cuming, an engineer, said: “The paramedic couldn’t get the tube in, she couldn’t understand why, she was shaking and she started to cry. I suggested using a vacuum cleaner to clear his airways. Harry was occasionally gasping for breaths.

“I managed to clear the airways by putting my hand down his throat and carefully controlled the vacuum nozzle.

“I remember the paramedics trying to do something with the intervention tube. I carried Harry to the ambulance, they struggled to find a vein and were having difficulties assembling the suction pump. I went in the ambulance. None of the ambulance crew took over and let me carry on.”

The youngster was pronounced dead 50 minutes later in hospital.

Harry, of Croston, near Preston, Lancashire, had been born six weeks early and was diagnosed with asthma at six months.

Four days before his death in October 2011 he had been discharged from Preston Royal Hospital. Mr Cuming and wife Vicky felt “fobbed off” by medics. He said: “The treatment Harry received clearly wasn’t working.

“We asked for a treatment review several times over the years but we were told he was on maximum dosage and couldn’t try anything else.

"He had more tightness in his chest and had a constant heavy wheeze in the last months of his life.”

Mr Cuming said the tragedy happened at 7pm when Harry and his brother Lewis, now three, had been watching TV.

Preston coroner Dr Simon Jones ruled Harry died from natural causes.

Mr Cuming said: “Harry was a little angel who cared for everybody and was a child who looked after everybody because he understood that life was precious because of his condition. He was a perfect little boy who did not deserve to die and is sorely missed by his little brother and us.”