A 3-year-old boy was sent home with a "sprained ankle" but had a rare and fatal brain tumor

A three-year-old boy died a year after doctors misdiagnosed him with an ankle sprain, not realizing he was fighting a rare form of cancer.

Logan Maclean's family took him to the doctor after noticing that he was limping and had trouble walking, reports the Daily Record.

However, doctors sent him home with a sprained ankle, unaware that the three-year-old was fighting a rare brain tumor called diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) – which has a survival rate without risk of 0%.

Her grandmother, Fiona Govan, 49, an official in Dalry, told the Daily Record: "Logan was a normal little boy who loved dinosaurs and the beach. To see it weaken was heartbreaking.

The Logan family claims to have driven in the Largs Medical group in October 2016, but the doctors sent him home without asking any questions.

His family took him to Crosshouse Hospital in Kilmarnock to the ER three times, when consultants found that weakness had spread to his arm. He then underwent a CT scan and an MRI.

On December 6, Sapphire Maclean, 29-year-old Logan's mother, and her grandmother Fiona received the terrible news that her cancer was incurable.

In February 2017, there was nothing left for Logan to do after six weeks of radiation therapy.

Fiona said, "Since DIPG is in the brain cell, it can not be operated on. All that radiotherapy can do is delay the progression of the disease.

"While the treatment helped, Logan was getting weaker and weaker.

"His speech disappeared, and he went back to crawling before it should then be lifted everywhere."

Logan died on October 17, 2017.

DIPG has also hurt the life of astronaut Neil Armstrong. Seven years before becoming the first man on the moon, his daughter Karen died of DIPG, two years old, in 1962.

Fiona added, "This summer, we have all celebrated the 50th anniversary of the moon landing. But more than 57 years after the death of Armstrong's daughter, little has been accomplished in terms of treatment, funding and awareness of the DIPG. "

Sapphire remains strong thanks to his younger son, Ezra, two years old.

She stated in the minutes: "DIPG is the automatic death sentence of a child.

"Yet there is little or no funding for research.

"Nothing could be done to save Logan but the doctors were not aware of the symptoms of DIPG.

"It must change."

Fiona helped launch a petition to introduce the issues related to DIPG in Westminster.

It has more than 40,000 signatures and needs 100,000 by Monday to ensure parliamentary debate.

Joanne Edwards, Director of Acute Care Services for the NHS Ayrshire and Arran, said, "Our condolences and thoughts go out to Logan Maclean's family.

"We encourage the family to contact us directly if you have concerns about the care or treatment provided to their loved ones."