A premature baby who was given just weeks to live continues to confound doctors by making remarkable progress.

Jardell Townsend, from Oxford, weighed just 2lb when he was born four months early last August.

He developed post-haemorrhagic hydrocephalus – fluid on the brain which causes the skull to swell – and further complications, including chronic lung disease, coliform on the lungs and epilepsy.

Three times, doctors at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital told his mother Hailey, from Blackbird Leys, to say her final goodbyes.

But Jardell battled on and in January Miss Townsend appealed to Oxford Mail readers for help to finding a specially-made hat for her son, whose head had swelled from 26.7cm at birth to 41cm around in a matter of weeks.

Our readers duly delivered and 80-year-old May Russell, from North Hinksey, was the first to knit Jardell a bespoke hat to keep him warm after he was discharged from hospital.

Three months on, his recovery has exceeded all expectations.

Miss Townsend, 24, who now lives in Wharton Road, Headington, said: “He had an appointment at the hospital on Tuesday and they have now told us to come back in six months.

“So far he’s over all the operations. He had bronchiolitis recently but got over that in a week and he’s just had his paediatric check-up and is doing extremely well.

“He’ll be on medication for the rest of his life, because he’s brain damaged and the doctors don’t know how that’s affecting him, but he’s doing everything he can.”