The family of a three-year-old boy who would ‘undoubtedly’ have lost his eye after an accident have praised the surgeons who saved his sight.

Mikey Hall was playing happily in the garden before he was rushed from his Sidmouth home to the Royal Devon and Exeter hospital, where West of England Eye Unit specialists set to work.

Now he is on the mend, his mum has launched a fundraiser to thank the medical staff.

Kat, a Mancunian who married Sidmothian Antony, said: “We were all in the garden. It was a really nice day, the first day the sun was properly shining. Suddenly Mikey was crying and holding his eye.

“It was horrendous. He was screaming and in a lot of pain - then he just went quiet. He was stunned.”

The accident happened while Mikey was playing outside at the family’s Sidford Road home with his six-year-old sister Chloe.

He was left with a Y-shaped wound across his iris and cornea.

Kat has worked as a 999 call handler, so knew she needed to act fast – but with the wound in such a delicate area, there was only so much she could do.

“It was horrendous,” said the 35-year-old. “We got stuck in traffic on the way to hospital and started to convince ourselves it wasn’t as bad as we thought.

“When we got to A&E we saw a nurse – but within a minute there were two surgeons.

“They were talking about surgery straight away, and they don’t normally operate on Saturdays. We kept trying to convince ourselves it wasn’t as bad as we first thought.

“The doctors said it would be touch and go whether the eye survived.”

Surgeons operated that day to stitch the eye up and Mikey needed another operation because the trauma caused a cataract. He has been prescribed eye drops and will need a further operation to take the stitches out.

Kat added: “Mikey knows he got an ouchie eye, but he doesn’t understand the severity of what happened. I think he’s lucky, because he doesn’t understand how serious it was.

“I just want to give something back. Without the doctors, he would have undoubtedly lost his eye. I want to thank all the staff at the hospital. They’ve all been really great.”

Keen runner Kat hopes to raise £300 for the West of England Eye Unit and will be running her first half-marathon on Sunday, May 28.

To sponsor her, visit www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/kat-hall.