After the devastating death of her aunt who was a key village figure, a woman is now determined to warn others about a lethal illness which can kill so suddenly.

Patricia Ford, from Yalding and known by most as Trisha, died of sepsis just 18 hours after a doctor visited her at home. She was 72.

Calling Yalding Surgery after three days of feeling unwell, Miss Ford was visited at home and told she had a sickness bug.

But she was actually suffering from urosepsis - a urinary tract infection which spreads to the bloodstream and moves throughout the body.

She died the next day.

Her niece Joanne Hazzard said: “It was such a shock - you do not expect someone to die if they are just vomiting. I assumed she had a heart attack.

“We later found out she had abscesses on her kidneys, some as large as 5cm in diameter, and one of these was leaking.

“The problem is quite often elderly people do not like to make a fuss.”

On Monday, March 11, Mrs Hazzard went with her aunt to a colonoscopy testing for bowel cancer, after blood tests showed something was wrong.

“A few hours after the hospital visit, she started feeling really sick.”

This was the last time she saw her aunt.

“It was such a shock - you do not expect someone to die if they are just vomiting..." - Joanne Hazzard

Mrs Hazzard’s husband, Steve, had a heart attack the previous week and was incredibly weak after catching flu in hospital, so Miss Ford refused to let her niece come round, fearing her illness was contagious and would be passed on to her nephew-in-law.

Miss Ford’s neighbour, Win, looked after her friend and they shared a fish supper together a few hours before she tragically died.

Mrs Hazzard added: “Win said she was a funny colour and was projectile vomiting, but she hardly complained.

“After the GP visit, I felt relieved he said it was just a bug. But Aunty Pat probably knew it was more than this.”

Miss Ford died on March 15, and following a post mortem a week later, it became clear it was not cancer making her ill but a urinary tract infection which ultimately led to her death.

Mrs Hazzard remembers her aunt, who moved to Yalding from south east London in 2007, as “the life and soul of the village.”

She added: “The children on her regular bus even held a two-minute silence in her memory.”

A previous member of the Royal British Legion (RBL), Miss Ford was honoured by the head officer for Kent who stood by her coffin during her recent funeral on April 22.

Friends from Sureway Pentecostal Church in Peckham went to pay their respects, while Miss Ford’s niece, 19-year-old Alana wrote and performed a song and the children from the bus served tea and coffee.

Mrs Hazzard, 49, said: “It was a real mix of people and showed how Aunty Pat just loved everybody.”

Living alone, she never married or had children but was very sociable and did a number of jobs to get by.

Sepsis kills 37,000 people in the UK per year - more than bowel cancer, breast cancer and prostate cancer put together. This means a person dies from sepsis every 14 minutes.

“I keep having moments where I think to myself I should have tried harder and insisted I see her, called the doctor myself and asked him to go back..." - Joanne Hazzard

Sepsis is the body’s often deadly response to infection. Most commonly it can arise from issues with the lungs, urinary tract, stomach and pelvis.

There are some key clues of sepsis, including extreme fatigue, confusion and vomiting.

If the illness is detected early enough and has not yet affected vital organs, it may be treated with antibiotics.

The term urosepsis is usually used to describe sepsis caused by a UTI, as Miss Ford had suffered.

Yalding surgery told the KM in a statement: “Our deepest sympathies are with the patient’s family. While we are unable to comment on specific care due to patient confidentiality, this was a very sad case and we offer our deepest condolences.”

Mrs Hazzard added: “I keep having moments where I think to myself I should have tried harder and insisted I see her, called the doctor myself and asked him to go back.

“But I had absolutely no clue what was actually happening. If a doctor says you are okay but you still have a niggling feeling, I would urge you to call again - do not ignore your symptoms.

“I do not want anyone else to experience what I have so please, if your loved one displays any of these signs, call 111 because it could be sepsis.”

For more details on the condition click here.

To keep up-to-date with all the latest developments with your local hospitals and other health stories, click here.