I Had To Save Myself From A Healthcare System That Used Photos Of White People To Dismiss My Pain

I was misdiagnosed four times while a tumour pushed my eye out of its socket. As a Black woman, I knew I’d have no choice but to save myself from a system failing me.

You know your body better than anyone – but what happens when no one listens? Welcome to Ms Diagnosed: a HuffPost UK series uncovering the reality of medical gaslighting. With new stats showing that 8 in 10 of women have felt unheard by medical professionals, we’re sharing the stories of seven whose lives were nearly lost to the gap between their symptoms and a system that refused to listen. As the UK introduces Jess’s Rule – a new mandate for GPs to ‘rethink’ after a third visit – we’re exploring why the medical system is still failing women and how we can start to fix it.

“There’s something going on with my eye,” I told the A&E doctor firmly.

I had a large bulge in my eye that was rapidly growing. In fact, my eye had pretty much come out of its socket at this point, and I was in agony.

I’d previously been told by a GP that it was an infected stye, so I told the A&E doctor the same thing and said I was worried about what looked like bruising. The A&E doctor said he couldn’t see any bruising on my eye, but he Googled ‘infected stye’.

All the pictures that came up were of white people.

“If you did have any bruising, this is what it would look like,” he said, gesturing to the screen.

I couldn’t understand what I was hearing. “I don’t bruise like that,” I eventually replied.

This is the reality of being a Black woman in the UK. I had to fight, every step of the way, to get my eventual diagnosis. If I hadn’t, I may not have lived – because the bulge in my eye turned out to be a symptom of cancer. I had acute myeloid leukaemia (AML), and my eye symptoms were due to a tumour growing rapidly, right next to my brain, and pushing my eye further and further out.

I first saw the bulge in my eye in early November 2022. I went........

© HuffPost