Why Is A Woman Denied to Leave the Hospital Until Doctors Properly Diagnosed Her Terrible Pelvic Pain?

Overview

You have to help me! Something is very awkward. She requested the 3rd ER doctor she noticed. He listened to her and did the appropriate tests, and a much more severe diagnosis emerged. Dismissed or wrongly diagnosed.

This happened in late 2017, and I had been feeling under the weather for several weeks. I was tired and achy. I even felt nauseous and dizzy. I was surely not pregnant. So I chalked it up to holiday stress, working, and the cold temperature in December month in New Jersey, where I reside and work as an editor and writer.

I soon started to feel dull pain on my right side. But I wasn’t convinced if it came from my lower back or groin. I reviewed the calendar and recognized I was due for my period. PMS, I thought. My period arrived and went, but the pain on my right side not tolerated only yet, my right leg was also stinging.

Why did I believe it was Appendix

I was serving full-time. And sitting in an uneasy chair for more than 8 hours a day. I supposed maybe the pain had something to do with all that time sitting. I began using a standing counter, but it didn’t help. Then I assumed appendicitis. Why did I believe it was my appendix? Google, of course. I had noticed such symptoms, which included intense pain on the right side, plus stomach bloating and nausea.

One afternoon in mid of December month. The pain was just intolerable. I was at work and assigned a slack to my editor: My appendix spate, I guess. Going to ER. Bye and taking leave for now.

Misdiagnosed in the ER

At the emergency room, a kind nurse inquired, “On a scale of one to ten, how crucial is your pain?’

It’s a 20,” I replied.

She gave me an amazing look. I assumed she guessed I was trolling for meds.

I’m not here for medication. I told her. I think my appendix ha been burst. She took forward me into a hospital bed and pulled the curtain. I folded up into the fetal condition in my a black turtleneck sweater and black jeans.

I’ve had unusual experience in hospitals. 3 years earlier, I have taken treatment for thyroid cancer. I experienced thyroid removal surgery and radiation process, which necessitated various hospital visits for tests and doctor appointments. I was still cancer-free at my last screening done, and I didn’t think it had something to do with the symptoms I was now facing.

I’m a single mother. Therefore, I asked my brother to pick up my son from school. The ER doctor, a goofy, jolly guy, came in and examined me. When he pressed on the area where my appendix is situated. I arrested with pain. He proceeds with blood tests, an x-ray of my pelvis area, and one abdominal ultrasound.

Why It happen to me

After some hours, the test results were produced, and the doctor diagnosed me with a “benign ovarian cyst”. I was discharged from the hospital and advised to take Motrin. Also recommended to use a heating pad, and further follow up with my ob-gyn. An ovarian cyst was producing all that pain? And stinging in my leg? I went home doubtful. Very next day, when I went to see my ob-gyn at his clinic. She confirmed that I did have a small size of cyst on my right side of the ovary.

When I saw up ovarian cysts later. I learned that these are not uncommon in menstruating females. A cyst can develop during ovulation when the follicle that’s assumed to rupture and deliver an egg fails to do so. Another type of cyst occurs when fluid collects in the follicle. All together are benign cysts that tend to resolve themselves automatically. Yet sometimes they produce pain in the left side of the pelvis or lower right. Read about this on womenshealth.gov.

Not Accepted

I still wasn’t so convinced a cyst was the root of the obstacle. And how did it describe the tingling and deadness in my leg? That night I took a Motrin, and cocktail of Tylenol to quell the discomfort and tried to go to sleep.

A second trip to the hospital

I was back in the hospital again at the emergency room hours later because I threw up. This time pain in my right side had become unbearable. Between these 2 symptoms. I was much sure that my appendix was the problem. I was hospitalized at the same hospital. But another ER doctor investigated me this time.

Another Confusing Journey

I drove up. I can’t stand up straight. That doctor questioned me ‘Are you pregnant?’. At this point, I really just suffered it. The pain was terrifying. I was tired.

“Are you advising I’m someone who doesn’t understand they’re pregnant until the amateur is crowning? The reason is that I’m not in labor class, my friend. Do I really look pregnant?” I pulled my shirt against my flat stomach.

He prescribed a transvaginal ultrasound, then read it after the scan. He declared that you have a cyst. Cysts are very painful. Your appendix is absolutely fit and fine. He prescribed me an Rx for Percocet. It was a kind of pain-killer drugs, which took the edge off the pain. Thereafter my dad dropped me at my home. I was fatigued and figured I’d deal with the matter in the morning. But even with the written painkiller, single symptom persisted as usual: the tingling and numbness in my right leg.

I need your help. Since there is something very wrong.

The next day morning, I couldn’t get come out of the bed. My right leg was still numb, and the pain in my side was terrible and horrible. My father was already on his way over to see and help me get my son to school. Once my son was on his way, my father actually carried me out of bed to get me into his car and plan to go to another hospital.

This time, we arrived at Hackensack University Medical Center located in northern New Jersey. I was really unable to walk and So I did use a wheelchair to go inside the hospital. The admitting nurse assisted me to change into a gown. Then a brutally handsome doctor flung open the curtain and sat on the bed.

What was results this time?

Christine, I studied the medical reports from the other hospital. You do have a cyst which is very small. I spoke to your gynecologist. I know her personally. But she doesn’t think the cyst could reason this kind of pain. Talk to me. What a satisfaction it was to be dealing with a specialist who didn’t just place up some tests but truly spoke to me and wanted to listen to me.

I want an MRI and morphine. I will not leave this hospital until I get properly diagnosed. I have a young kid, a pet, also a job. It’s Christmas season going on and I am in the neck and head cancer remission. I summarized to him about my diagnosis and treatment did for thyroid cancer in 2014. The radiation and surgeries, I endured. My other regular doctor checkups.

Continuing Critical Pain

I have been admitted many times in hospitals for years. I know about my body now. I explained to him. I’m very much confident something more is wrong than a minuscule cyst. I hold my hand on the doctor’s hand. I said You have to do something for me. I am telling you that something is very wrong & critical.

He wrote a morphine IV drip and the MRI test. He carefully paid attention to me. He even gave me a cup of lemon Italian ice. After an hour, he came back to read the MRI results to me. What he found out appeared as a complete surprise.

Finally, the right diagnosis

Christine, you have a herniated disk issue at L5 level. L5 is a vertebra under the lower back. It is leaking now. It is also pushing on the sciatic nerve; which is making the extreme pain, numbness and tingling in your leg. You require spine surgery. Therefore I am admitting to you for the same.

A herniated disk? Because of the cyst diagnosis, I was suspecting something along those lines, like ovarian cancer. Then a lightbulb switched
off.

I recall my past

I entered in the snow! I was playing with my dog and son. I slipped! I instantly blurted out to the doctor. I docked directly on my bottom. It was a hard impression; I remember sensing a vibration. I search on google since I was achy the next day so took some Tylenol. The same thing told my doctor.

Gone through various Studies

Things fell into place now. I read at Mayo Clinic, A herniated disk occurs when something happens to one of the rubbery discs (or cushions) between the vertebrae that make up towards the spine. If one of the discs produce a tear because of an injury, the soft cushion within can start to leak out. This disturbs nearby nerves and muscles, numbness, causing pain, or weakness. In my case, the disc was disturbing the sciatic nerve, which runs from the lower back over the butt and hips and down both legs.

McDreamy explained that adults get herniated disks for several reasons. genetic predisposition, excess weight, occupational hazards, or like me, blunt force trauma that fall in the snow.

Undergoing spinal surgery

I chose to have my disc treatment at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City. The operation happened 2 days later. I had a microdiscectomy, a technique that practices small tools to create a small incision. A microscope enables the surgeon to consult the disc before operating. I needed only a tiny sliver of my disc removed. The part that was pushing on the sciatic nerve, triggering the radiating discomfort.

I tarried in the hospital overnight, then went on disability for 8 weeks and attended physical therapy to extend my left and right sides. Turns out I was placing all of my weight on my left side for a lengthy time, without even realizing it, to relieve the pain on my right side provoked by the herniated disc. And that ovarian cyst? It eventually terminated.

No more pain—but some words of advice

It’s been further than a year since I got the correct diagnosis for my pain; and had surgery to alleviate it. I came away with remarkable insight: If I hadn’t pushed for myself, necessitated that MRI, and didn’t get annoyed and insistent that a cyst was not at the root of my discomfort. I’d still be hurting. It would also have stopped getting the right diagnosis, and my disc surgery would have been dangerous.

So I’m glad I asked on going back to the hospital until I was considered seriously; and then endured until I found a surgeon who listened to me. I’m now pain-free and back to my normal life. Attending to what my gut told me made all the difference.