Simi’s Lovectomy – One Patient’s Journey
I am claim number 165XXXXXXX. Staring up at the ceiling, I am being wheeled, flat-backed and vulnerable, into a surgery I never in a million years expected to be having. So lucky they caught it...
Medical Stories
Maria Davila lay mute in a nursing home bed, an anguished expression fixed to her face.
Photo Credit Jeenah Moon for The New York Times. Nursing Homes Are a Breeding Ground for a Fatal Fungus. Drug-resistant germs, including Candida auris, prey on severely ill patients in skilled nursing facilities, a problem...
Share Your Story
Have you or an immediate family member experienced harm due to medical treatment? Are you a medical professional with a story to share? You can help others to avoid or deal with a similar situation… Read More
A DOCTOR’S DECEPTION
For 30 years, Paul Shuen was one of the city’s most respected obstetricians. Then his nurses noticed something unusual about the way he delivered babies. A story of greed, betrayal and medical misconduct. The labor...
James sat by his bedside, as any parent would, and wondered how this could happen.
Alex James knew how to exhaust himself. It started on his childhood swim team when his coach, a whistle-blowing, red-faced caricature, demanded he swim to the end of the Olympic-sized pool and back again—without taking...
Doctors Confess Their Fatal Mistakes
Doctors, nurses, and pharmacists hold your life in their hands. Here, their shocking stories of what can go wrong—and what has to improve to keep us safe. “It was more than 20 years ago, but… Read More
“She whispered, ‘When is my doctor coming?’ ‘Soon,’ I lied.”
By Sunnie Bell, RN. I was the nurse in charge of the evening shift at a small hospital. I was enthusiastic and experienced—a top graduate of a prominent nursing school. I had come on duty...
“I gave her some pain meds and discharged her from the ER. Then I picked up the next chart in the bottomless stack.”
By Bryan E. Bledsoe, DO. I’ll never forget her—in fact, I still have dreams about the look on her children’s faces after she died. Her name was Claire,* and she came into the ER where...
“Heavy perspiration, shortness of breath—his symptoms were textbook. The only thing was, I hadn’t read that chapter yet.”
By Robert M. Wachter, MD. I was a second-year medical student at the University of Pennsylvania, and on my second day of rounds at a nearby VA hospital. Penn’s philosophy was to get students seeing...
“Her name was Emily, and she was two years old.”
By Eric Cropp. It was a busy Sunday in the pharmacy at Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital in Cleveland. The hospital’s computer system had been down for about ten hours before I started my shift,...