A miracle baby is continuing to defy doctors after being told on six occasions that she wouldn’t see the next day.



Tiny Paige Battrick from Accrington was born 16 weeks premature weighing just 1lb 1oz and is among the smallest babies ever to be delivered at Royal Blackburn Hospital.



Paige – who was born on August 7, 2009, has battled through a nine-month health ‘nightmare’ at a  series of hospitals.



Six separate times medics told Paige’s mum and dad, who live on Sharples Street, Accrington, to say their last goodbyes to her.



Kelly and Lee opted against turning Paige’s life machine off after a doctor showed them a picture of her lungs which she said resembled those of a 90-year-old who smoked 100 cigarettes a day.



And now, despite suffering multiple illnesses due to her premature birth – including cerebal palsy, chronic lung disease, holes in her heart, bleeds on the brain and not being able to chew or swallow – Paige is finally out of hospital.



She is now able to roll around in her play pen without her breathing being assisted by extra oxygen.



Her dad Lee, a former chef who is now a full-time carer for Paige and his other daughter two-year-old Lillie Mae, said: “It has been a nightmare but Paige is a miracle.



“She has been told six times she will die or she won’t make it through the night or that we have to come to a decision to turn her machine off.



“But she has fight and spirit and is still with us.



“She has spent five weeks on a Neo Natal ECMO Unit – designed to re-oxygenate the blood and get it pumping  at a hospital in Leicester.



“And eight weeks on a ventilator at St Mary’s Hospital in Manchester. When doctors in Burnley Hospital asked us if we wanted to turn Paige’s life-support machine off we thought, ‘here we go again’.”



“It took us a while to make that decision. But we decided to try and gradually get her off the ventilator and to hopefully bring her off it alive.



“After all that she was finally allowed to go home with us – nine months after she was born. But we were still told she wouldn’t see her first birthday.



“But she is here and we are amazed.



“It is an absolute miracle but it is still scary every time she does go in hospital which makes every day a blessing.”



Her twin sister Scarlett, who was born four ounces heavier, sadly died aged three months.



Their parents managed to hold a christening for Scarlett before going through with the heartbreaking decision of turning her life-support machine off after she’d had two brain hemorrhages.



Lee added: “When we did get Paige home we thought ‘let’s make the most of the time we’ve got’.



“She was on three litres of oxygen per minute which was the maximum allowed.



“But a month later she came off the oxygen for the first time.



“And more than a year later she is here with us at home still but regualrly visting the hospital.”



Paige – who drinks and eats through a tube – is currently waiting to be referred so surgeons can close a valve in one of her heart.