PARENTS of a brave little girl born with one of the rarest conditions in the world have raised hundreds of pounds to say thank you to doctors.

Dulcie Rackham arrived at Colchester General Hospital last February through a natural birth.

Parents Brady and Hayley, as well as their son Jack, three, were expecting a perfectly healthy little girl after a smooth pregnancy.

But after she was born, doctors knew there was something wrong.

Mr Rackham, who lives in Holland- on-Sea, said: “They knew instantly something wasn’t right.

“Dulcie had to be resuscitated and was put on a ventilator. She had a cleft pallet and a single palmar crease (a single crease that extends across the palm of the hand), which can sometimes be associated with abnormal medical conditions.”

Mr and Mrs Rackham had an anxious three-day wait until the tests came back to reveal Dulcie had unbalanced chromosomes.

Dulcie’s condition is so rare there is no specific name for it and it is not known if there is another person in the world who has exactly the same condition.

While she is almost one-yearold, Mr Rackham said she acts much more like a four to sixweek- old.

He said: “She was kept in Colchester General Hospital for eight months because she wasn’t well enough to come home.

“She was allowed out in October and she comes back to the hospital, as well as Addenbrooke’s, in Cambridge, regularly for check ups and treatment.

“Because Dulcie’s stomach is so small she needs to be fed 19 hours a day through a gastrostomy tube which feeds her directly into her tummy.

“She does recognise faces now and smiles, but that’s about it.

“We just take every day as it comes. Unfortunately, after four months off work I had to go back. It is very hard.”

Wanting to thank the doctors, nurses and midwives at Colchester General Hospital, the family decided to hold fundraisers.

On Christmas Day, Mr Rackham, an estate agent, dived into the sea at the Clacton Christmas Swim in his wife’s underwear with friends to raise money.

Donations have also come in thick and fast from people attending Clacton Golf Club, which is run by his dad.

Yesterday, Mr Rackham handed over a cheque for £1,000 to Colchester General Hospital’s children’s ward. He said: “I want to thank Tom, Andrewand Malory for coming into the sea with me. The nurses are like our family.

I know we can’t speak for other people’s experiences, but I don’t understand how they get so much negative press.

“They have been absolutely first-class with us and we can’t thank them enough.”