![\"Mia](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/0_Mia-Lucas-in-her-secondary-school-uniform.jpg\")
Mia Lucas was found unresponsive in her room by staff(Image: Supplied)<\/p>\nShe was sectioned after having violent outbursts at home and hearing voices in her headMia Lucas was found unresponsive in her room by staff(Image: Supplied)<\/p>\n
A 12-year-old girl from Nottinghamshire<\/a> died at a mental health unit she was taken to in Sheffield after suffering from ‘acute psychotic episodes’.<\/p>\n Mia Lucas, from Arnold<\/a>, was found unresponsive in her room just weeks after moving to Becton Centre, a specialist children\u2019s mental health facility<\/a>, in January last year.<\/p>\n An inquest, which opened at the Medico-Legal Centre in Sheffield on Monday, November 17, is examining questions around Mia\u2019s mental health history, her placement at the mental health unit and her care at the facility, including risk assessments around self-harm.<\/p>\n An 11-person jury is hearing evidence from healthcare professionals from the Queen\u2019s Medical Centre (QMC<\/a>) in Nottingham, Nottinghamshire Healthcare Foundation Trust (NHFT) and Sheffield Children\u2019s NHS<\/a> Foundation Trust.<\/p>\n Mia was first admitted to the QMC on New Year\u2019s Eve in 2023 after her grandmother raised concerns about her behaviour, the inquest was told.<\/p>\n She had been displaying \u201cquite a number of unusual behaviours\u201d at home, including violent outbursts and hearing voices in her head, according to Dr Aisha BaMashmous, a child and adolescent psychiatrist for NHFT.<\/p>\n \u201cShe was getting involved in altercations with her mother which was unusual for her,\u201d the doctor said.<\/p>\n \u201cShe was hearing voices, telling her she needed to go to heaven or something would happen to her family.<\/p>\n \u201cShe tried to access a knife in the kitchen, fighting through her mother to harm herself.<\/p>\n \u201cShe was very upset about seeing her mother vaping and thought she would have lung cancer and needed to save her mother.\u201d<\/p>\n Mia had been hearing voices in her head for at least two months prior to her admission and had suffered from a viral infection two weeks before, which had been affecting her sleep, Dr BaMashmous said.<\/p>\n Mia was kept in hospital due to her challenging behaviour and was detained under section 2 of the Mental Health Act on January 4 after an assessment determined she was displaying \u201cacute psychotic behaviour and was a risk to herself and others\u201d, the inquest was told.<\/p>\n While on a ward at QMC she was confused about the identity of her mum, and discussed self-harm and suicidal behaviour with another patient, Dr BaMashmous said.<\/p>\n She was given Flurazepam, a benzodiazepine medication, but continued to fight its effects, becoming more and more agitated.<\/p>\n Tests were undertaken to determine whether Mia\u2019s mental deterioration was due to a physical health condition, however the doctor said all the results were normal \u201cat the time\u201d.<\/p>\n When asked by senior coroner Tanyka Rawden what could have caused Mia\u2019s psychotic episodes, Dr BaMashmous said it could have been due to her experience of \u201cintense\u201d physical and verbal bullying.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are reasons for us to think maybe she was overwhelmed and that could have added to her psychotic presentation,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Due to being too young for most mental health units, Mia was transferred to Becton Centre in Sheffield, which cares for children and young people with serious and complex mental health issues.<\/p>\n She was admitted to the facility\u2019s Emerald Lodge ward on January 9, but, less than three weeks later – on January 29 – was found unresponsive in her room by staff.<\/p>\n She was pronounced dead at the Sheffield Children’s Hospital emergency department the next day.<\/p>\n Ms Rawden told jurors they were likely to hear the frequent mention of autoimmune encephalitis – a rare, inflammatory brain condition which is caused by the immune system mistakenly attacking healthy brain cells in response to a previous infection – throughout the 10-day inquest.<\/p>\n The proceedings are also expected to hear from Mia\u2019s mum who was present in court with a knitted doll of her daughter wearing a horse-riding outfit.<\/p>\n The inquest continues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"She was sectioned after having violent outbursts at home and hearing voices in her headMia Lucas was found…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":268280,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[65570,102,2960,104,83873,15257,100141,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-268279","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-arnold","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-healthcare","11":"tag-nhs","12":"tag-nottingham-university-hospitals","13":"tag-nottinghamshire","14":"tag-queens-medical-centre","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom","17":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268279\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/268280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/1_girl-12-died-we-1428257.jpg\")
Mia and her mother Chloe<\/p>\n