A TEENAGE girl has a condition that makes her eyes, nose, ears and fingernails seep blood.
Marnie Harvie, 16, is thought to be the only person in the UK, and possibly the world, with the frightening symptoms.
Doctors are baffled by the bleeding — which starts without warning and can happen up to five times a day.
Countless scans and tests have failed to find a cause for the condition, which leaves Marnie exhausted and suffering migraine-like headaches.
It has forced the brave youngster to put her life on hold. She has had to drop out of college and has struggled to find a job, boyfriend or go on holiday, because of the bleeding.
Marnie, from Stoke-on-Trent, said: “I never know when it’s going to happen and I don’t like scaring people.
“When the bleeding comes it burns if I dab it with a tissue. I have to let it happen until it stops, which normally takes about half an hour.”
Marnie started coughing up blood following a chesty cough in February 2013.
She explained: “For the following two years I was back and forth to Staffordshire hospital for blood tests but they all came back clear.”
Marnie was plagued with headaches and started missing so much school her shop assistant mum Catherine, 43, and factory worker dad Lee, 44, were even threatened with legal action.
Then in July this year, “gloopy tears of blood” began to drip from one of her eyes. The next day, she bled again from her eyes, nose and ears.
Marnie admitted: “I was so scared. I used to go out with my friends every day but I became too scared to leave the house.
“I had to leave Facebook because people started rumours I had Ebola. I could hide my bleeding eyes behind sunglasses in the summer but I can’t do that now so I stay at home.”
Catherine said: “She’s had MRI scans, CT scans and multiple blood tests.
“As far as results were concerned she was the picture of health.”
NHS medical notes, shown to The Sun, make clear: “There is no family history of any bleeding or joint problems.”
One medical student, who examined Marnie, even suggested stigmata, a term used by Christians to describe marks or pain in locations corresponding with Jesus’ crucifixion wounds.
The family have found one other similar case. In 2008, Twinkle Dwivedi, 14, was reportedly bleeding mysteriously in India.
Catherine said: “Her symptoms are different. Marnie doesn’t bleed through her feet or head. From what we can tell an official diagnosis has still not been made.”
She hopes sharing Marnie’s story brings new hope of a diagnosis for her daughter.
She added: “I want to find a way to help put a stop to this so she can live her life.”
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