A calf cramp should not be a brush with death. Mine almost was.

For five days, I had what felt like a stubborn muscle spasm in my left calf. It was tender, swollen and getting worse. I assumed it was a muscle problem and went to my chiropractor, who treated it as a muscle issue.

But the pain kept worsening, and I turned to an AI health tool I had built for myself, based on my expertise training companies on how to adopt AI tools effectively, using my medical records, medications, lab work, and visit notes. It flagged deep vein thrombosis, or DVT, and pointed me to the diagnostic step that mattered: an ultrasound.

DVT is a blood clot in a deep vein, usually in the leg. The blood clot symptoms include pain, swelling, warmth and skin color changes, especially when they affect one leg. It also said suspected DVT should be assessed urgently and, when a doctor thinks DVT is possible, the patient should be referred for an ultrasound scan quickly.

So I called my primary care office, which advised me to schedule an appointment or go to urgent care. Ordinarily, that would have sounded sensible. But urgent care could not provide the scan. My doctor’s........

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