WellMed doctor saves life of retired public servant who was misdiagnosed

Stomach pain turns out to be life-threatening condition missed in hospital

Mary Lockhart is used to being strong and active. She has spent her retirement in prison ministry following two storied careers: one as a teacher and another as one of the first Black woman to serve as a detective with the Dallas Police Department.

Then came the day she had a stomachache she couldn’t shake. “It was cramping, spasms, a variety of pains and getting progressively worse,” she said. “I was kind of embarrassed to go to the hospital for stomach pain.”

A desperate Mary called her daughter and son-and-law to take her to the hospital. She was so weak, her son-in-law had to carry her to the car.

That was on a Friday. She stayed in the hospital a few days, getting medication to stop her vomiting. She was released Sunday, but the pain persisted. So, on Monday, she went to her primary care physician, Dr. Tamika Perry at WellMed at Redbird Square in Dallas.

Dr. Perry examined Mary and told her that her stomach was quiet. Mary recalled the conversation:

Mary: “I thought it was supposed to be quiet.”.

Dr. Perry: “Not this quiet.”

Dr. Perry ordered a CT scan to get to the source of her stomach pain. When Dr. Perry got the scan back, she immediately arranged to get Mary into surgery. Scar tissue from an appendectomy had built up over the years and was blocking her colon. If it wasn’t removed quickly, Mary would die.

“By the grace of God and Dr. Perry, I’m still alive,” Mary, 81, said.

How racial and gender biases result in misdiagnosis

Mary said she won’t go back to the hospital that misdiagnosed her but understands mistakes happen. “Sometimes medical people mess up,” she said.

Numerous studies have found that as Black women such as Mary are at a comparably higher risk of a misdiagnosis. The lead author of a study on medical misdiagnosis, published July 2024 in BMJ Quality & Safety, said women and ethnic and racial minorities to be 20-30% more likely than white men to experience a misdiagnosis.

Beyond doctors’ potential personal biases, researchers find systemic racial and gender biases contribute to the problem. White men historically have been the default for illustrations in medical textbooks, clinical trials and medical equipment design.

For example, studies have found pulse oximeters to be inaccurate for patients with darker skin, leading them to get less supplemental oxygen than they need. There long has been a myth that Black people have higher pain tolerance than white people. A study in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science found half of medical students and residents surveyed believed Black people have thicker skin or less sensitive nerve endings than white people, or Black people’s blood coagulates faster.

Dr. Perry, a Black woman, doesn’t just count on studies to tell her there’s a problem. She said in her experience as a patient, she’s been treated disrespectfully, or as if she was complaining for no reason or potentially drug-seeking. Dr. Perry said whenever she has to go to the emergency room as a patient, she tells the medical staff she’s a physician to be sure to get the respect she, and any patient, deserves.

Dr. Perry said the environment is improving, with younger physicians and residents showing signs of being trained in a more inclusive manner. But there’s a long way to go.

“Mary’s story is not unique,” Dr. Perry said. “If I were to query my clinic and ask the other providers, they’d say they’ve found things missed in African-American women. It’s to the point that when our patients are seen by other specialists, they come back to us and say, ‘This isn’t right.’ There’s such a distrust. It’s rooted in realness.”

Feeling healthy, but Dr. Perry comes to the rescue again

Today Mary is feeling strong and healthy. She’s moved out of the Dallas area to Texarkana, Texas, but regularly makes a 350-mile round-trip to see Dr. Perry. “I try to stay on top of things and go to my annual exams,” Mary said. “Dr. Perry sits down with me and goes over every category. She told me I needed vitamin D and wrote a prescription for it.”

Mary also takes medication to control her blood pressure and other medications as needed. “But that’s about it, except when my back talks to me sometimes,” she said. “Usually people are amazed that at 81 years old I don’t have a lot of major health problems.”

Recently Mary started feeling shoulder pain. She went to an orthopedist, had an X-ray and was told it was arthritis. The pain persisted, so she called Dr. Perry.

Dr. Perry ordered an MRI for Mary. The diagnosis: torn rotator cuff.

References

1. KFF Health News. “Women and minorities bear the brunt of medical misdiagnosis.” Accessed July 1, 2025. https://kffhealthnews.org/news/article/medical-misdiagnosis-women-minorities-health-care-bias/
2. “Skin pigmentation influence on pulse oximetry accuracy: a systematic review and bibliometric analysis.” Accessed July 1, 2025. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9102088/
3. Proceedings of the National Academies of Science. “Racial bias in pain assessment and treatment recommendations, and false beliefs about biological differences between Blacks and whites.” Accessed July 1, 2025. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1516047113