A grieving couple have been told no one knows why their 10-day-old daughter died.

Sarah Gaffney and Luke Dayus, the parents of Pheobe Rose, said they were disappointed an inquest into her death had no answers.

Speaking after the inquest Miss Gaffney, of Swaledale Court, Warndon, Worcester, said: “Anything would have been better than just leaving it open, but at least it’s over now.”

Mr Dayus said: “We’d rather have had a reason.”

Your Worcester News reported previously how the couple woke to find their baby had died while lying beside them.

At the hearing on Wednesday, they were forced to relive that moment.

An emotional Miss Gaffney, aged 20, recalled the moment she found her daughter and Mr Dayus, 23, said: “Sarah screamed and ran out of the room. I jumped up and pulled Pheobe Rose towards me.

“About three weeks before, I’d done a bit of first aid training.

“I checked her airways and started doing resuscitation and told Sarah to phone the ambulance as quickly as possible.”

The couple told Worcestershire Coroner’s Court that Pheobe Rose had gone to sleep on a pillow between them after a feed at 3am.

Dr Phillip Cox, who carried out the post mortem, said there were no signs of injury, hereditary illnesses or diseases.

The postmortem’s only findings were that Pheobe Rose had nasal congestion caused by a low level virus and blood in her lungs.

Her brain had pinpricks of damage but Dr Cox said the little girl had probably been born with them and, had she lived, they would have been undetected.

He said he did not believe anything he found caused her death but the findings made him rule out cot death – or Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) – as that was based on a postmortem finding nothing at all.

He said: “It’s sadly very common. We see about 100 babies a year and 60 or 70 babies will be death not ascertained or SIDS.”

Dr Cox said the baby co-sleeping with her parents had not caused the death.

Worcestershire Coroner Geraint Williams gave the cause of death, on Monday, August 3, as not ascertained but said it was completely natural.

Mr Williams recorded an open verdict.