Ouch! I must say, she got lucky they diagnosed the cobalt poisoning in time.

I do not know who these Very Important Patients are, what sort of insurance they carry, what their social-credit ratings are, or what sort of providers they see, but this article reads to me like an episode of “House MD” or “Doc Martin”.

I can only vouch for my personal lived experience, as a mentally ill man living in poverty, on Medicaid and ACA plans. No provider would ever in a million years do this kind of diligence for any condition. Not in the Emergency Department for sure . They run standard tests: every test that insurance will pay for, every test that my credit rating will bear, and then they slap on the most common treatments and try to get me outta there ASAP.

I’ve long had alleged thyroid issues and alleged organ troubles that can be wicked mimics of myriad conditions, and Levothyroxine (Synthroid) in particular can engender some horrific psychiatric symptoms.

So bravo to the genius providers who evidently needed to apply for grants and/or needed to get monographs published in the JAMA, so much so that they went to considerable and unnecessary expense to figure out this lady’s issues.