Emergency Medicine Physician Misses Diagnosis of Ectopic Pregnancy

Case Overview

This case involves a twenty-nine-year-old female patient who presented to the emergency room with severe abdominal pain and scant vaginal bleeding. She was using an IUD at the time and concern arose that it may have perforated her uterus. After receiving the general workup for abdominal pain that included a negative urine pregnancy test, the patient was sent for a CT-scan of the abdomen. During the diagnostic study, the patient sustained cardiac arrest in the abdominal radiology ward. CPR was initiated and performed for forty-five minutes but a normal rate and heart rhythm were unable to be attained. After further investigation on autopsy, it was determined that the patient fatally suffered from an ectopic pregnancy that ruptured while she was on the CT-scan table. The patient’s cause of death was due to internal hemorrhage and cerebral hypoxia secondary to cardiopulmonary arrest.