My Dad Got Sick—Doctors Dodged, AI Didn't |
My dad was in the emergency room, short of breath, chest tight, upper back aching. He looked pale and confused. An ultrasound showed excess fluid between his lung and chest wall.
“We’ll drain it,” a resident said, as if he were unclogging a sink.
For the next five days, thick, red-tinged fluid filled a plastic container beside my dad’s hospital bed. His cells were sent for “staining,” a way to identify cancer. But no one used that word.
Nurses rotated through, drawing smiley faces next their names on a white board when they switched shifts. Doctors discussed biopsies and blood thinners and mentioned malignancy in a relentlessly relaxed tone. Their manner didn’t match what I saw.
Breakfast remained untouched at lunch. And a cough that was a minor nuisance had become big enough to break a rib.
“What’s your pain level today?” the pulmonologist asked.
“It was a four,” my dad said. “Now it’s a six.”
Tylenol wasn’t cutting it. The doctor suggested morphine.
“We keep treating symptoms,” my dad questioned, “but what’s the cause?”
“Hopefully it’s an infection,” the doctor said. “We’ll try antibiotics.”
But my father didn’t have a fever.
After nearly a week in the hospital, a resident casually mentioned that my dad had malignant epithelial cells. I called the doctor in charge.
“He has cancer,” she confirmed, “but we don’t know which kind.”
The pulmonologists didn’t talk about cancer. Oncologists hadn't been consulted because pathology needed more time to make a definitive diagnosis. And I didn’t know I should ask for palliative care.
My dad was discharged. But a few days later, he returned with blood clots, breathing difficulty, and intense pain. I approached the doctor coordinating his care.
“Excuse me,” I said. “Is my dad dying?”
“His vitals are stable,” he said, “but I’m not an........