As a parent, the only thing worse than being sick yourself is when your child is sick. Parents want to do everything in their power to protect their children and keep them safe. That includes wanting to help their children get better when they’re not feeling well.
When a parent rushes their child to the emergency room at a hospital, it’s because the parent believes something is seriously wrong. It’s also because the parent believes the doctors at the hospital will be able to help their child.
What many people don’t know is that sometimes the doctors in the emergency room misdiagnose what is wrong with the patient. In fact, according to a study, 7.5 million people each year are misdiagnosed in emergency rooms in the United States.
A misdiagnosis can be quite dangerous. Not only does it mean that the patient is receiving treatment for something that he or she does not have wrong with them, but it also means that the real problem isn’t being addressed at all.
CNN’s Jake Tapper knows all too well the negative impacts of a misdiagnosis. His daughter Alice was misdiagnosed in the emergency room, and it took months in order for her to recover.
Alice was experiencing a lot of pain in her stomach area. Even though her mother, Jennifer, suggested that the doctors in the emergency room check her for appendicitis, and even though Alice’s pediatrician thought the source of pain might be appendicitis, the doctors in the emergency room insisted that wasn’t the case. They believed that it couldn’t be appendicitis because the pain wasn’t contained to the lower right area where the appendix is located. They also believed it couldn’t be appendicitis because Alice passed a jump test. The doctors were wrong.
Watch the video below to learn more about Alice’s misdiagnosis, how she was finally correctly diagnosed and what parents should do to try to prevent their own children from getting misdiagnosed in the emergency room.
Does it surprise you that the doctors misdiagnosed Alice? Does it surprise you that 7.5 million people are misdiagnosed in emergency rooms each year? Have you ever been misdiagnosed?
