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    Hoyo AfrikaBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 8:17am

    It’s a known fact that the medical profession tends to underestimate the pain felt by their black patients, female or male. The reality is that the profession doesn’t view black folks in the same way they view non-black folks. It’s no surprise to me considering that Silas Weir Mitchell, the man who inspired many modern forms of medicine, used to say: The savage does not feel pain the way we do. Also, Henrietta Lacks.

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      Cardi B's Other ShoeHoyo Afrika
      7/19/17 8:28am

      And that’s why I shrug when they get on TV boohooing about the opioid epidemic and shifting the blame to doctors over prescribing drugs. The good doctors weren’t passing out pain pills to black folks like candy because they believed we were lying about the severity of our pain OR assumed we were lying about the pain and seeking drugs because all black people are druggies.

      Just say no.

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      Hoyo AfrikaCardi B's Other Shoe
      7/19/17 8:35am

      Honestly, when people started talking about OMG, Fetanyl is out here killing people!, I just shrug. They literally started the war on drugs by insinuating that heroin and weed use amongst black folks was ruining the moral fabric of America. America and her white junkies can choke.

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    hocuspocusoctopusBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 9:08am

    That poor child.

    It’s a damn shame that stories like this are so well known that this is one of my biggest fears. Seriously? Antibiotics for chest pain and when she came back, they still brushed her off? No X-ray? Fuck. Just all the curse words.

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      MasterKimbo
      7/19/17 4:05pm

      An x-ray wouldn’t show blood clots, but they certainly should have done an echocardiogram, which will show them. DO NOT fuck around with chest pain!

      Also, antibiotics? What the actual fuck was that doctor thinking?

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    So That HappenedBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 9:12am

    In what broken world is inflammation of the chest wall, words the doctor actually used, with an unknown cause in an otherwise healthy teenager something that you don’t need to worry your pretty little head about? Oh, wait, I know. That poor family.

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      TurkeyandPastramiSo That Happened
      7/19/17 2:05pm

      Bingo.

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      HermionesBeadedBagSo That Happened
      7/19/17 8:22pm

      Costochondritis is actually common among athletic people and teenagers due to growing pains. I’m a doctor though family/internal medicine is not my specialty; however I do remember that from medical school.

      That being said, this still is extremely negligent. They gave her antibiotics for suspected chest wall pain? That makes no sense. And they couldn’t even do a chest XRay? Go into the ED with a paper cut and you get a CT scan. These doctors did not believe her story and instead of ruling out life threatening etiologies, as we’re trained to do, they jumped straight to “it’s probably nothing.” You always need to rule out life threatening conditions before sending a patient home. This is a disgrace.

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    BiturbowagonBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 11:39pm

    I started to compose a snarky, ironic post in support of her, but I just can’t.

    I feel bad for her, and for her family.

    I wish she had been taken seriously.

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      TheBurnersMyDestinationBiturbowagon
      7/22/17 12:25am

      Me too. Women (and especially WOC) often have the pain they are experiencing dismissed by medical professionals, as if all of us just pretend to be in pain for, idk, the fun of going to the emergency room. In reality, I know several women who had their appendix burst who just assumed they were having severe menstrual cramps and just carried the fuck on until they basically collapsed. I know others who spent years being prescribed tranquilizers for real issues they were having that were dismissed as them just “overreacting” or “getting too worked up about things.” In 2017. We deserve to have our pain taken seriously.

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      Dr. SechmethTheBurnersMyDestination
      7/22/17 2:15am

      three years of constant pain and dramatic weight loss thanks to inflammation of the pancreatic duct. But I “looked good”, “should eat more” and “its just cramps” or”must be pregnant”. Fuck (my) dismissive male doctors.

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    ArtistAtLargeBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 10:12am

    Sue the fuck out of them.

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      redzedArtistAtLarge
      7/19/17 11:21am

      Yeah. I’m on board with that.

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    Dinosaurs and Nachos, Very Legal and Very Cool!Breanna Edwards
    7/19/17 9:49am

    I am not a doctor and my guess was blood clots. So clearly, this is not a matter of a weird health issue and Dr. House wasn’t available or some shit.

    Jesus. RIP Yunique.

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    s3rp3ntsBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 12:00pm

    I had something similar occur just after I graduated college. I visited the ER with chest pain, coughing with phlegm, and an excruciatingly high off-and-on fever. No matter how much acetaminophen, NyQuil, etc., I downed, I couldn’t stay within a normal temp range and then my diaphragm started to ache. So I took myself to the ER. First doctor INSISTED I had a virus, and wouldn’t do anything for me. “Go home, continue to do what you’re doing, and you will get better.” Bish, what?! I had 102º temperature off-and-on for three days. I had green shit tinged with blood coming out of my mouth when I coughed. But this is a “virus” that you’re not even going to culture? I left, waited overnight, and came in at the CRACK of dawn the next day. This tiny African dude caught my case and did it allllll. He’s listening to my lungs, swabbing me, had me x-rayed, brought me water... Came back and was like, “You have pneumonia.” Pulled out my x-rays, pointed out the areas in which the inflammation was located and, because the (white) doctor from the day before had so grossly misdiagnosed me and I was clearly broke, packed his lab coat and the lab coat of a partner he brought with him with samples of all the antibiotics I’d need. Damn horse pills, man; but a good two weeks of them that they stuffed into my backpack.

    I could’ve died because the first doctor basically did no tests, and rushed through her exam as though I were making it all up.

    I ended up losing 20#s, was nearly hospitalized (my temperature kept spiking), and was out of work for three weeks. When I returned to work, I could only make it through a half-day before I had to go home to rest. I’ve never been that sick before or since.

    If you are well enough, be FORCEFUL. Go to another doctor (I know - a near impossibility). Raise HELL. Because they do not give a DAMN about you.

    And don’t be fat, ohhhhhh don’t be fat. “You just need to lose weight.”

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    TurkeyandPastramiBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 2:03pm

    Full disclosure: I lost my mom last year after her second pulmonary embolism within a 10 year span, so this is sort of difficult to talk about. I also practice medicine, and even prior to losing my mom, I have heard of such horror stories from families of deceased ER patients. Working in medicine and losing my mom to this make me question my existence. I lived far from her but she also had her symptoms dismissed by a doctor, only to die 3 days later (we had no case, our lawyer said).

    To read this case breaks my heart. Especially with the loss of someone so young. ER MD’s experience malpractice cases at rates higher than most of their other peers. I cannot tell you how many stories you hear like this, of patients of all colors. A patient went to the ER, was “worked up” and discharged home, and then suddenly and catastrophically passed away. It is a sad reality and for every 10-15 cases where chest pain is really a non-cardiac or pulmonary issue, there is a case like this that is unfortunately humbling. MD’s have to practice defensive medicine, in the possibility of these cases, which drives healthcare costs high and 99/100 will show nothing.

    Now I am going to tell you that in this case, that last paragraph is undeniably moot. This hospital dropped the ball by the second ER visit. This is a young patient. She has unusual symptoms for her age, that merited a detailed ER workup. It is not clear from this post that they pursued a cardiac workup either, which was also indicated, but could have been done as an outpatient once EKG didn’t reveal any acute changes. This girl should have gotten a CT of the chest by the second visit (an x-ray can often show unremarkable or nonspecific changes in pulmonary embolism). Hell, a PE doesn’t always manifest with chest pain (my mom fainted after her second PE and never woke up). THEN she should have had a workup on why she was prone to clotting (aka hypercoagulable) after that, because this is NOT NORMAL. This doesn’t JUST happen. In many cases, there is some underlying condition, whether it be cancer or a hematologic disorder, that needed to be found and treated. It should not be dismissed. Cases like this are used again and again, to teach other medical professionals about the extremes and exceptions, and “zebra” cases. For all we know, she had widespread cancer in her body and no one knew. Or maybe she didn’t. (I suppose the autopsy will be revealing). But make no mistake, this was no zebra. This was tragic, and at the very least other steps should have been taken to diagnose her condition-bottom line; so, so sad.

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    SkitchBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 11:00am

    I had chest pain a few years ago, and I didn’t think much of it. I went to Urgent Care, and man, you would have thought I pulled the fire alarm. They threw me onto the bed, strapped me up to an EKG machine, called the ER to have a cardiac doctor waiting, and requested an ambulance come to the Urgent Care. I was 31 at the time, so I wasn’t real worried because I thought I was too young for anything serious (it turned out not to be—it was actually inflammation, like they said this girl had, but they made SURE before they released me). I asked if it was usual to go to this trouble, and the doctor told me that when someone comes in with any kind of chest pain whatsoever, their protocol is to get them to a cardiac doctor immediately. She said chest pain is never to be taken lightly, and that their approach was to be overly prepared than under-prepared.

    So, this hospital? Yeah, they fucked up.

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    CAMBreanna Edwards
    7/19/17 12:05pm

    I am in tears. This tragedy could have been avoided. Several years ago, I experienced similar symptoms and went to the ER. They drew blood, did an EKG and told me it was heartburn and prescribed antacids. The weight on my chest was so heavy and painful, I drove myself back to the ER the next day. They found nothing and were about to send me home when the Nurse Practioner suggested a scan for clots. It was a pulmonary embolism. She saved my life that day. Please listen to us when we say/know something is wrong.

    My deepest condolences go out to this beautiful girls family.

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      saucissonCAM
      7/20/17 9:06pm

      I was sent home with an inhaler after I reported not being able to walk 10 feet without having to stop and catch my breath. I couldn’t walk up the stairs at work without having to sit down. Two days later my doc called me back with the D-Dimer results and told me to go to the emergency room, where they did a CT and the attending took one look at it and turned white. I had a massive bilateral clot and was probably 24 hours away from permanent lights-out.

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