In this months Vogue magazine Serena Williams tells the story of how she had to essentially give medical staff specific instructions on how to save her life after she gave birth to her brand new baby.
According to Vogue: “(Serena) walked out of the hospital room so her mother wouldn’t worry and told the nearest nurse, between gasps, that she needed a CT scan with contrast and IV heparin (a blood thinner) right away. The nurse thought her pain medicine might be making her confused. But Serena insisted, and soon enough a doctor was performing an ultrasound of her legs.
‘I was like, a Doppler? I told you, I need a CT scan and a heparin drip,’ she remembers telling the team. The ultrasound revealed nothing, so they sent her for the CT, and sure enough, several small blood clots had settled in her lungs. Minutes later she was on the drip. ‘I was like, listen to Dr. Williams!’”
Now women of color are coming out all over social media saying this has been their experience as well, and sometimes doctors ignoring the requests of women of color has lead some of them to them lose their lives. Check out the tweets below!