Make Medicine Better

I was sent to Barnes Hospital in St. Louis after being seen by several doctors. The symptoms pointed to ovarian cancer, rhuematic fever and congestive heart failure and West Nile disease. Day after day I visited doctor after doctor until I went to Barnes Hospital in the middle of the night. I was admitted but my insurance was not notified, and I spent a total of 14 hours in a patient bed. During that 14 hours the only thing tested was my blood (or so I thought). At the end of the 14 hours the doctor on staff came in to tell me that my weight gain of 22 pounds in one month was due to anxiety and that I was a “medical mystery”; I was discharged. About 20 minutes after the discharge, a tech came in to take blood and I asked why because I was going home.. she told me that the first blood samples were lost and she was there to take a second sample. All in all I spent 14 hours and $1,226 for not notifying my insurance company; there were essentially no tests completed because the blood samples were lost and I was sent home with the idea that anxiety had caused my rapid weight gain, 18 hours of sleep every day and diarreah. Once my OB/GYN at Memorial Hospital at Belleville, Il received the report from Barnes, he decided to do additional texts. Wa-la! I have Celiac Disease; it wasn’t anxiety at all. I feel it’s a shame that people like myself go to the hospital in the middle of the night and have to foot the bill for very substandard care with no intelligent diagnosis given.