Eddie, 43, was at Auckland International Airport when she was informed that a diuretic she had taken for the past four years to control her blood pressure and side-effects of her paraplegia was banned.

She was due to compete in three events, including a team relay, which start Baie-Comeau, Quebec, on Monday (August 16). 

Her ineligibility meant her two team-mates also had to pull out of the relay.

Eddie, who was paralysed five years ago after a horse fell on her, said she was devastated her six-day-a-week training sessions, which stretched for up to three hours, would come to nothing.

"It's like a death or a loss or something because my whole focus for the last year has been this event," she said.

Paralympics New Zealand made the decision to stop her from going because, if she was found to have the drug in her system, she faced a two-year ban.

"So it's just not worth it because, once you have that drug cheat thing on your name, you'll never get rid of it," she said.

The former policewoman and competitive horse rider, who is currently ranked second in the world in her grade, said she had submitted the required paperwork listing all the medication she was on to Paralympics New Zealand six weeks ago.

She had done so before every major event in the past, including two previous World Championships, but said it appeared that a loophole had meant the drug had gone undetected until now.

Paralympics New Zealand (PNZ) high-performance manager Grant Sharman said: "It would appear that Sam was taking a medication that appeared to be fine but, on closer examination, was not fine."

Paralympics New Zealand had begun an investigation that would look to establish how it went undetected for so long, whether there would be retrospective implications and how the organisation could stop it happening again.

Sharman said: "I've got to reiterate that we really feel for Sam.

"She's worked really hard for this."

Eddie said she was now focused on the London Paralympics in 2012.