Patient Stories

On Valentine’s Day 2013, I woke up with what I thought was a stomach virus. A few hours later, I was in the ER with a diverticulitis attack that split open my intestine and spent 10 days in the hospital. A few months later, I had another diverticulitis attack, but I caught it early and…

In November of 2022, I was driving home from work when out of nowhere, my heart started hammering and went out of rhythm. I made it home and told my partner that I wasn’t okay and needed to go to the ER immediately. We got as far as the local urgent care where I told…

My younger sister Marsha had many blood clots over the years. She found out that she had protein S deficiency shortly after our father died in 1998. She had veins that were painful and found a doctor who was willing to strip them (phlebectomy). Marsha asked him about her history with clots. The doctor told…

I had my beautiful baby boy on August 26, 2023. I had a low-risk pregnancy and a water birth with no complications. At 2.5 weeks postpartum, I began to get a headache that I assumed was from sleep deprivation. As a migraine sufferer, I am used to severe headaches and had not been on my…

I was at the Walmart self-checkout. I had been feeling sore and had a hard time catching my breath all day, and I collapsed in the self-checkout. I came to, and people were standing over me. I say I’m all right, but my pain is getting progressively worse. I ended up driving myself to the…

As told by her mother, Tina. My daughter Kaylie passed away at the age of 21 from bilateral pulmonary emboli that had gone undiagnosed even though she had been to the doctor just three weeks prior to her death. Her symptoms were severe upper back pain near her shoulder, shortness of breath, and rapid heart…

I had knee surgery and was six weeks post-op, so I had no worries about clots. I was also on birth control, though. I stretched one night and felt excruciating pain in my left rib. I could barely move. I managed to get to a hospital and was told it was costochondritis — inflammation of…

As told by his sister, Kenzie We made a family trip from Texas to Colorado at the end of July 2022, which is an 8-9 hour drive. Landon had asthma that was triggered by cedar. Since the trip, he had some allergy symptoms but associated that with the cedar. On August 5, 2022, my brother…

In July 2018, I developed a nagging dry cough and chest discomfort. I have a history of pneumonia, so I went to urgent care for a chest x-ray. It was clear and I was told I likely have a viral chest cold. The cough continued to linger on, not responding to over-the-counter cough medicine. As…

I experienced deep vein thrombosis during my senior year of college that turned into a pulmonary embolism, which derailed my college baseball career. My symptoms included shortness of breath, leg swelling, calf pain and fatigue. Upon being rushed into the ICU due to the size of my clot and severity of the PE, I was…