Pregnant woman wrongly diagnosed as being HIV positive

This content was originally posted in 7DAYS UAE website at: Pregnant woman wrongly diagnosed as being HIV positive A woman who was told she had HIV while nine months pregnant said she cried for days before finding out it had been misdiagnosed. Khizra Afreen, a Pakistani housewife who lives in Ajman, was told she had the virus by medical staff at the GMC Hospital in Sharjah on December 10, about two weeks before her second child was due. The 28-year-old says she was informed by a doctor that her baby was also at risk of having the disease and that she would possibly have to give birth by Caesarian section. For three days, she believed she had the disease and was going to be kicked out of the country as the UAE has a policy of deporting people with HIV, which, if untreated, can lead to the disease AIDS. But after getting another blood test at a laboratory in the Ministry of Health branch in Sharjah, the results were negative. Afreen said: “When the doctor told me that I was HIV positive, it felt as if the ground beneath me started shaking. I was told that it might transmit to my baby. “All I could think about was my future – will I be able to have more kids? What would this mean for mine and my husband’s relationship? How will my family and society react? “For three days, I couldn’t look at myself and I couldn’t stop crying.” However, Afreen’s agony turned to relief after the result from the second lab. But there’s also anger, too. “I couldn’t believe such a big mistake could happen by medical professionals,” she said. “It’s not chicken pox, it’s HIV. They should’ve checked again and again. I hope no one has to go through what I went through.” The lab director at GMC Sharjah, Dr Palat Krishna Menon, told 7DAYS that “one out of every 1,000 pregnant patients stand a chance of being tested as HIV positive” due to an increase of antibodies. He said: “When she tested HIV positive, we sent her to the Ministry of Health as required by the law. We can’t take risks like that. “It is very rare that a pregnant woman would be reactive to HIV antibodies. In cases like this, the test has to be done more than once to get proper results.” Menon said the patient should have had a second test at the hospital. However, Afreen says she was never contacted to take one. sarwat@7days.ae Read the original story at: Pregnant woman wrongly diagnosed as being HIV positive