“I don’t trust this hospital,” said Dr. Susan Moore from an Indiana hospital bed with an oxygen tube tied to her nose. “That’s not how you treat patients.”
Moore, an Indianapolis doctor who was being treated for COVID-19 at North Indiana University Hospital, died of the virus this week. Earlier this month, she posted a video on Facebook telling her she thought she was not receiving proper medical care because she was black.
Moore tested positive for coronavirus on Nov. 29 and said his symptoms include high respiratory rate, high heart rate, high fever and coughing up blood. She described the upward battle she faced in getting treatment from white doctors and nurses in the hospital, including begging for the antiviral drug Remdesivir, hours of waiting for pain treatment and requesting a CT scan of her chest to prove her pain was real.
Her scan detected pulmonary infiltrates and inflamed lymph nodes, she said, but she continued to wait for hours for pain treatment.
“All I know is that I have intense pain,” Moore said in the heartbreaking video, adding that the doctor minimized her pain. “[The doctor] it made me feel like I was addicted to drugs and he knew I was a doctor. ”
She spoke to a patient lawyer, who she says told her nothing could be done. She also asked to be transferred to another hospital, but was told she should go home.
“This is how black people are killed,” Moore said. “When you send them home, they don’t know how to fight for themselves.”
As a doctor, Moore clearly knew what to ask for, but she struggled to keep pleading for herself as her condition worsened.
“I proposed and I argue, if I were white, I wouldn’t have to go through that,” Moore said. “And [the doctor] he did not return and apologized. ”
Eventually, Moore was sent home, but less than 12 hours later, she developed a fever and her blood pressure dropped, so she returned to the hospital.
GoFundMe
“Those people were trying to kill me. Clearly, everyone has to agree that they will release me too soon,” she wrote. “Now he’s treating me for bacterial pneumonia as well as Covid pneumonia.”
Moore’s story has become too common for black Americans because COVID-19 disproportionately devastates black communities across the country. Black Americans are 4.7 times more likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 than white Americans and three times more likely to die from the virus.
According to a GoFundMe set up to cover his family’s expenses, Moore’s son Henry Muhammed, 19, is “in a good mood”, but now he has to deal with her death as well as the dementia of his grandparents. Dr. Moore had been the only provider in the family.
GoFundMe
Henry previously enrolled at Indiana University to study biochemistry and math, but put his school on hold to care for his mother and grandparents. A GoFundMe update said some of the funds will be used to ensure his school continues.
“Susan was a phenomenal doctor,” organizers said in a statement. “She enjoyed practicing medicine, she enjoyed being a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., she enjoyed helping people, and she was apologetic.”
In Moore’s Facebook post, she said the hospital’s chief physician told her staff she would receive diversity training and apologize to the doctor treating her.
“We are very saddened to hear of Dr. Susan Moore’s death and our hearts are on her friends and family,” the hospital said in a statement Wednesday.
“As an organization dedicated to equity and the reduction of racial disparities in healthcare, we take allegations of discrimination very seriously and investigate every allegation. Treatment options are often agreed upon and reviewed by medical experts in a variety of specialties, and we maintain the commitment and expertise of our caregivers and the quality of care provided to our patients on a daily basis. “