Head and neck surgeon David Grant returns from annual leave to find his surgical list has snowballed. He's one of only two consultant surgeons at Nottingham University Hospitals' busy cancer head and neck service.

On most days in winter, the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit at Queen's Medical Centre is full. Intensive care is often the last resort for very sick children, a place that can keep them alive while doctors work on making them better. It's also where children undergoing the most serious surgery come to recuperate. It's the job of lead consultant paediatrician Patrick Davies to balance the ever increasing demands that are made on the over-flowing unit every day. Lack of children's intensive care beds is a nationwide problem. Four-year-old Esme is rushed to Queens Medical Centre from Hull, 90 miles away, when her closest intensive care units in Leeds and Sheffield are both completely full. She is suffering from septic shock, an extreme form of sepsis, a life threatening condition that occurs when the body reacts to an infection by damaging its own organs. Patrick and the team must stabilise her so that her life is out of danger.