Four-year-old Olivia Elliot from West Lothian suffered a life-threatening stroke after the common chickenpox virus caused severe inflammation in a main neck artery, doctors at an Edinburgh hospital discovered.
The stroke left the youngster unable to speak, eat or move the left side of her body. Medical specialists believe the condition was triggered by a chickenpox infection she had contracted six months earlier, in December 2024.
Olivia's mother, Rebecca Elliot, 31, initially assumed her daughter had caught a routine sickness bug when the four-year-old woke up vomiting and complaining of a headache. But within hours, Olivia lost the ability to grip her mother's hand and kept toppling onto her left side.
Mrs Elliot rushed her daughter to A&E at St John's Hospital in Livingston. While sitting on her mother's lap in the hospital, Olivia lost movement down the left side of her body, her speech became slurred and one side of her face drooped.
"I started screaming 'something's not right. Something's happening to Olivia,'" Mrs Elliot recalled. "The most heart-breaking thing for me was looking at her. She didn't look like Olivia at all. Her face was so drooped and she couldn't eat or speak."
Following the sudden deterioration, emergency medical staff rushed Olivia by ambulance from Livingston to Edinburgh's Royal Hospital for Children for specialist treatment.
Diagnosis and link to chickenpox virus
At the specialist children's hospital, medical teams performed a barrage of blood tests and MRI scans. The diagnostic tests revealed severe inflammation in one of the main arteries in Olivia's neck, which had cut off crucial blood and oxygen supply to her brain.
Specialists explained to her parents that the life-threatening stroke occurred as a direct result of swelling in her major arteries triggered by the chickenpox virus, medically known as the varicella-zoster virus, which Olivia contracted over Christmas.
Chickenpox is a widespread viral infection primarily marked by itchy skin blisters and fever. While most children recover quickly, medical data shows that in approximately one to two out of every 1,000 chickenpox cases, the virus reaches the brain and causes encephalitis, or brain swelling.
Mrs Elliot admitted she was unaware that young children could suffer strokes. "I didn't think children as young as four could have strokes," she said. "A simple headache turned out to be something really serious. She had chickenpox in December, just before Christmas, she had lots of spots but she wasn't unwell really. I thought we'd had an easy case."
Medical background and initial warning signs
Olivia had already overcome major health challenges prior to the stroke. While pregnant with Olivia and her identical twin, Mrs Elliot developed selective growth syndrome, a rare complication of twin pregnancies where one fetus fails to receive adequate nutrition and blood supply. Olivia's twin sister was lost during the pregnancy.
Olivia was subsequently born nine weeks early and was diagnosed with mild cerebral palsy after doctors detected brain damage following her birth. Cerebral palsy is a lifelong neurological condition that affects movement, posture and muscle coordination. Despite her medical history, Olivia was fiercely independent and had made a full, speedy recovery from chickenpox.
Her parents had no reason to believe a life-threatening crisis was ahead. The emergency unfolded during the night when Mrs Elliot's husband found Olivia vomiting clear liquid, leading Mrs Elliot to keep her home for a sick day.
While mother and daughter were playing darts at home, Mrs Elliot noticed her daughter struggling to hold the dart between her fingers. "I put my finger into her hand and said, 'Can you grab Mummy's hand?' She couldn't do it," Mrs Elliot said.
Although Mrs Elliot initially wondered if the weakness stemmed from her daughter's cerebral palsy, she contacted her business partner, who specializes in brain injuries, for advice before taking Olivia straight to St John's Hospital.
Hospital stay, recovery and warning for parents
Following her emergency admission on June 29, Olivia spent eight weeks in hospital before being discharged to return home on August 11.
Now five years old, Olivia relies on a walker at school while she continues physical therapy to rebuild her strength. Her mother reported that Olivia adapted naturally to her recovery because she was already accustomed to physiotherapy and medical appointments.
"She never complains. She just gets on with it. She's such a tough kid. She's such a happy kid," Mrs Elliot said.
While stroke predominantly affects adults over the age of 65, experts note that stroke incidents among young people are increasing. Childhood stroke remains uncommon, affecting roughly 400 children in the UK every year, according to figures from the charity Brain Research UK.
During their first two weeks in hospital, the family met two other families whose children had suffered strokes, including one boy who had experienced his second stroke.
Mrs Elliot is now warning other parents that childhood stroke symptoms can differ from common public expectations, which usually focus on the BE FAST acronym for Balance, Eyes, Face, Arms, Speech and Time.
"Olivia's main symptoms were vomiting and a headache, which you don't associate with strokes," Mrs Elliot said. "Most people think of the 'BE FAST' analogy. But strokes can happen at any age, at any time. Life is so busy and things are so easily skipped by."
Mrs Elliot has since founded Olivia's Steps Foundation to support families of children with disabilities. "This is something that happens to people," she added. "If something doesn't feel right, trust your instincts."
