A 39-year-old American woman underwent aggressive chemotherapy after being diagnosed with a rare, terminal form of cancer… only to later discover she wasn’t sick.
- Lisa Monk was diagnosed with a rare and fatal cancer of the blood vessel walls called clear cell angiosarcoma.
- Doctors suggested he undergo aggressive chemotherapy.
- After two sessions, she discovered that she didn’t actually have cancer.
An American woman underwent aggressive chemotherapy to try to stop terminal cancer, only to learn months later that she had never been ill.
Chemotherapy: doctors only gave him 15 months to live
Suffering from severe stomach pain, Lisa Monk, a 39-year-old Texan, went to the hospital at the end of 2022. The tests carried out revealed the presence of kidney stones, but they also spotted a mass at the level of his spleen. It was removed during surgery scheduled for January 2023. While the operation went well, the mother of two then received some frightening news. Laboratory tests on the mass revealed that she had a rare, terminal form of cancer called clear cell angiosarcoma. And his prognosis is very grim. “It was a cancer that forms on the lining of blood vessels, found in the spleen and [le médecin] told me the most optimistic thing he could say was to give me 15 months [à vivre]”explains the patient in a video taken by the Mirror.
Doctors then prescribed “aggressive” chemotherapy. She started it in March 2023. The treatment was particularly difficult for the mother to bear. After losing all of her hair, she suffered from severe vomiting during the second session of treatment. “It was a very dark time. I wrote goodbye letters and letters to grandchildren I will never meet and for weddings I will never attend”recognizes Lisa.
But after a month of treatment, the American received very disconcerting news during a routine medical appointment: she never had cancer.
Medical error: “the doctor then told me that I had never had cancer”
As she answered questions from a nurse who was viewing her file on the computer, she saw the healthcare professional change her expression. “She turned to me and looked completely horrified and told me she had to go see the doctor, then she ran out of the room. She left me alone for about 15 minutes and the doctor came and spoke to me with a lot of medical jargon and then told me that I didn’t have cancer.”says Lisa Monk.
At first, the mother believed that the treatment had worked… but it was a completely different scenario that was playing out. “The doctor then told me that I never had cancer. [À ce moment-là] I looked and felt like I had cancer because I was vomiting and sick and my skin was gray from the chemotherapy, explains the American. The doctor then congratulated me, which really bothered me.” For her, “I’m sorry” would have been much more appropriate.
While looking at her chart, the patient noticed another problem. The report which allowed the nurse to spot the error dated from a month earlier. Which means the hospital had this information before her second round of chemotherapy.
“I had chemotherapy during this time and they could have told me a month earlier. I would have avoided the second round of chemotherapy if they had bothered to read their own pathology report.”
Their error is not without consequences. A year later, Lisa Monk and her family are still impacted mentally and financially since the involuntary patient has not been able to get the hospital bills waived at this time. “A year after what happened to me, I am angry. They ruined my health and my insides are cooked”concludes Lisa Monk.
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