A child who received dozens of injuries after being placed into the care of a couple for a Christmas break has been left permanently disabled from a head injury.

Now that Flaxmere couple has been sent to prison for the abuse of the boy who was just 4-years-old at the time and needed two craniotomies while in their care.

Larissa Wainohu and Whare Ramsey appeared for sentence in the Napier District Court on Tuesday.

Wainohu, 33, who earlier pleaded guilty to causing grievous bodily harm with reckless disregard, assault on a child and neglect, was sent to jail for five years and three months.

Ramsey, 28, who was deemed by the judge to be less culpable in the boy's abuse, admitted assault on a child and neglect. He was jailed for three years and 10 months.

Judge Geoff Rea turned down defence applications to extend the name suppression that has applied to the couple as they progressed through the court process.

However, he suppressed the names of the children involved in the case, most of whom do not share the couple's surnames. He also suppressed the names and details which would identify caregivers and whanau who are now looking after them.

The abuse and neglect of the boy happened between November 2018 and January 2020, when he was four, and the total of six charges, one of them representative, covered a number of incidents.

The Crown case against the couple said the boy suffered two head injuries while in their care, and both times was flown to Wellington for craniotomies.

In between these two head injuries, Oranga Tamariki placed the boy in the care of another person. By arrangement with Oranga Tamariki, the boy was returned to the couple for Christmas 2019, when he was 4 years old.

He suffered the second, more serious, head injury when he was still with the couple the following month. Judge Geoff Rea said it was now known that Wainohu caused that head injury, which occurred when Ramsey was at work.

Because of that head injury the boy's life will be "permanently altered in that he will suffer permanent disability", a Crown summary said.

A hospital paediatrician said it was almost certain that the boy would have died had it not been for the prompt actions of paramedics and Hawke's Bay Hospital staff.

Judge Rae referred to a report by Dr Bronwyn Rosie, which said she counted 63 injuries on the boy's body.