A stroke victim in Australia said she’s suing a hospital after staffers allegedly told her she had possibly had a drink spiked.
Amalia Young, 24 at the time of the incident, said she went to the hospital in May 2016 with a lack of feeling on the left side of her body.
Young was rushed to Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital by her boyfriend but received startling news there from doctors. They told her she had her drink spiked.
“They said to me, ‘Well possibly drink spiking,’” she claimed.
Young went home but several hours later, woke up with a massive headache and couldn’t put any pressure on part of her head, so she went to another hospital.
But staffers at Greenslopes Hospital allegedly told her they believed she was faking her symptoms.
Her local doctor, 11 days later, found that she'd suffered an Ischaemic stroke that eventually hemorrhaged, leading to permanently impaired cognitive ability and partial blindness, 7 News reported.
Tests taken later showed that Young suffered the major stroke that night but also suffered three mini-strokes in the following four months.
A representative for the Women’s Hospital said the hospital couldn’t comment on the situation.
“We do not have signed consent from the patient to talk about their case and therefore due to patient privacy we are unable to address these allegations,” she said. “However what we can say is no patient requiring treatment is ever turned away from our hospital.”
Lawyers for Young said that the official discharge sheet stated that Young suffered “somatoform disorder.”
They added, “Which essentially means they could not find a physical explanation for her physical symptoms and her symptoms were more likely explained as being from a psychological cause.”
According to the Stroke Association, people who show symptoms of a stroke require immediate medical attention.
Young said her main purpose is to change the hospital’s policies so someone else doesn’t suffer the same fate that she did.
“I don’t want this to happen to anyone else,” Young said. “I want the hospital to look into their processes. I also want to get rid of the stigma that only old people get strokes. Young people get them as well.”
