A MOTHER woke up to find her seven-week-old baby ‘unresponsive’ in her bed, an inquest heard.

Despite the best efforts of his mother and paramedics to revive him, ‘perfect’ Shay Smith was pronounced dead at Royal Blackburn Hospital, assistant coroner Mark Williams heard.

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An emotional hearing at Burnley Magistrates Court was told Kristy Rebecca Smith missed her ‘precious, perfect little baby’ every day and always would.

Miss Smith, 21, was living alone with her son in Whitehall Street, Nelson, when the incident happened on April 5.

In a statement read out by the coroner, Miss Smith said there had been no health issues with her son in the weeks leading up to his death.

Miss Smith said she had fed her son around 10pm on April 4 and he had fallen asleep. She took him upstairs and put him in his Moses basket which was next to her bed, the inquest was told.

Miss Smith said: “At one point he started crying in the middle of the night. I picked him up and put him in bed with me. I put all the pillows up so I was sitting more or less upright. I had Shay cradled in my arms to the right hand side. We had both fallen asleep. I woke up around 7.30am and found Shay was unresponsive.

“I rang for an ambulance. They told me what to do with resuscitation and I did the best I could. The paramedics arrived and they took over.”

The inquest heard paramedics attempted to revive Shay throughout the journey to Blackburn, but he was pronounced dead when he arrived at the hospital.

Miss Smith added: “He was a precious, perfect little boy who I miss every day. And I always will.”

Consultant paediatric pathologist Dr Melanie Newbold carried out a post-mortem examination but said she could find no obvious cause of death, including no external or internal signs of injury.

She said: “What we have got is a little boy dying suddenly and unexpectedly after a few weeks of life. He was well-grown and he was thriving. We use the term ‘unascertained’ which means the baby died suddenly and unexpectedly and without finding a cause.”

Mr Williams came to a conclusion of death by natural causes.

He said: “It is clear from the evidence that this is not an isolated incident. You are not alone in this. Not that that makes it any better for you. But there are similar deaths of children which fall in to this classification. But that is not a cause. The cause of death is unascertained.

“You can rule out everything other than a natural cause of some kind.

“Please can I offer you my sincerest condolences.”