Dr. Susan Moore died on Dec. 20 of complications from COVID-19, her son told the New York Times. The internist died about two weeks after she shared a video accusing an Indiana University Health North Hospital (IU North) doctor of ignoring her pain complaints and medication requests because she was black, even though she was both a patient and a doctor self.
In a video posted earlier this month, she filmed herself from a hospital bed and shared her experiences at IU North. Moore said her doctor brushed off her symptoms and said to her, “You’re not even short of breath.”
“Yes, I am,” said Moore in the video, which she shared on Facebook on December 4.
She had to beg for remdesivir, she recalled in the video, the antiviral drug used to treat patients hospitalized for COVID-19 who do not require mechanical ventilation.
And despite her pain, the doctor told Moore he might send her home, she said, uncomfortable giving her any more drugs.
“He made me feel like a drug addict,” she said in the video. “And he knew I was a doctor.”
Moore had also posted updates to her Facebook page in addition to the video.
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Moore, who was an internist, said her pain was not “adequately treated” until she voiced her concerns about her treatment. She was later released from IU North but returned to another hospital less than 12 hours later, she wrote on her Facebook page.
“I did and I maintain that if I were white, I wouldn’t have to go through that,” Moore said.
A spokesperson for IU North confirmed to CNN that Moore was a patient in the hospital and that she was eventually discharged, but declined to say more about her, citing the patient’s privacy.
“As an organization dedicated to equality and reducing racial inequalities in health care, we take allegations of discrimination very seriously and investigate every allegation,” said the spokesman.
In a statement Thursday, Dennis M. Murphy, president and CEO of Indiana University Health, defended the technicalities of the treatment Moore received, admitting “that we may not have shown the level of compassion and respect we strive for in understanding what matters most to patients. “
He also asked for an external review of the case.
Racism in health care is nothing new
Moore’s story speaks to a broader issue of what experts call implicit racial bias in black patient healthcare. Studies have shown that in some situations, black patients are prescribed less painkillers than their white counterparts. And a recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine attributed inequality in part to “persistent racist cultural beliefs and practices.”
The article cited a 2016 study that found half of white medical students and residents had “unfounded beliefs about intrinsic biological differences between black and white people,” falsely believing that black patients’ pain was less severe than white patients. .
“Acceptance of this unfair treatment as ‘normal’ is historically rooted in and supported by the belief that black people are intrinsically susceptible to disease and do not, implicitly or explicitly, deserve high-quality care,” said the authors of the New England Journal of A Drug Article. wrote, comparing the issue of racism in medicine to racism in the police force.
Racial differences in medical treatment are further underscored by COVID-19, which has a disproportionate impact on color communities.
For a “majority of doctors, mostly white in the United States, the perception is that African Americans don’t need that much pain,” said Dr. Ala Stanford, a pediatric surgeon and the founder of Black Doctors COVID-19. Consortium.
Moore is leaving behind her 19-year-old son, Henry Muhammed, and her elderly parents, who both have dementia, according to a GoFundMe set up on their behalf.
According to the New York Times, Moore’s family said she was born in Jamaica and grew up in Michigan before studying engineering at Kettering University. She went on to receive her medical degree from the University of Michigan Medical School, the Times reported. On the GoFundMe page, she is described as someone who enjoyed practicing medicine and was proud to be a member of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority.
CNN has reached out to Moore’s family for further comment. Her son told the New York Times that she was adept at advocating for herself in hospitals, where she was often treated for sarcoidosis, an inflammatory disease that affects the lungs.
“Almost every time she went to the hospital, she had to advocate for herself, fight for something in some way, just to get the right care,” he told the Times.
“This is how black people are killed,” Moore said in the video, “if you send them home and they don’t know how to fight for themselves.”
Stanford acknowledged that Moore was not her patient, and she did not know what the situation was in the hospital where she was being treated. But she felt that Moore’s need to repeatedly stand up for her own concern was “unacceptable.”
In addition, Moore’s decision to ask for pain medication wasn’t just to relieve her pain, Stanford said, but it would also aid her recovery by making it easier for her to breathe. And Moore’s request for an antiviral drug is now part of the standard treatment for COVID-19, Stanford added.
“This is just simple,” said Stanford. “This is standard for what you get. I know that by taking care of enough people with coronavirus in the hospital and helping them through it.”
‘She is me and we are her’
Moore first tested positive for COVID-19 on Nov. 29, according to her Facebook post. On December 4, she was hospitalized at IU North in Carmel, Indiana. Only after a CT scan showed new lymphadenopathy – a disease in which the lymph nodes become enlarged – did the hospital agree to treat her pain, she said.
“You have to prove that there is something wrong with you to get the drug,” she said in the video.
Dr. Stanford said the lymphadenopathy would indicate that “the disease process had been going on for a while” and that Moore’s body was fighting the disease.
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According to her Facebook posts, Moore was eventually able to speak to IU Healthcare’s chief medical officer, who said he would make sure she receives the best care. He also said she would be given diversity training.
On December 7, the hospital fired Moore and sent her home, according to her Facebook post. But less than 12 hours later, she was sent to another hospital because of a fever and a drop in her blood pressure, according to the Facebook post. Moore said she was being treated for bacterial pneumonia and COVID pneumonia. She described the care in the second hospital as ‘very compassionate’.
The next day, Moore wrote that she was being transferred to the ICU. It was the last update shared on her Facebook page.
Her story has sparked an outpouring of generosity from people who have heard it, and the GoFundMe page has raised more than $ 100,000 as of Thursday night.
Dr. Alicia Sanders, another doctor who first came into contact with Moore after seeing her video, helped open the page to raise money for her family, including sending Muhammed back to school at Indiana University. Sanders said the reason she first came into contact with Moore was “heartbreaking.”
“She is me,” said Sanders, who is also black. ‘She is me and we are her. It could be one of us who happened. ‘
Stanford – who told CNN that she acknowledged implicit bias and racism in medicine, but chose to change things out of healthcare – echoed that comment. She told CNN that when she first heard about Moore’s story, it stopped her and brought tears to her eyes.
She shared it with a group of her friends – all black surgeons across the country. They could all relate it all together, Stanford said, after experiencing the same treatment despite their expertise.
“We all have the stories,” she said.
“If any of us get sick, please don’t shut up. Be watchful, be present, be public,” Stanford wrote to them, adding Moore, “She was one of us.”
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The video in the player above is from a previous report.