Wake Forest University Medical School faced heat for standing by a medical student who indicated about intentionally harming one of her patients after having a disagreement on transgender ideology. The medical school issued a statement which included fourth-year student Kychelle Del Rosario explanation.
In a statement, the university state that Del Rosario's tweet was not an accurate recounting of the incident.
Del Rosario Didn't Draw Blood Again, Claims University
The incident was brought to light in late March after Rosario boasted about it in a now deleted tweet. "I had a patient I was doing a blood draw on see my pronoun pin and loudly laugh to the staff 'She/Her? Well of course it is! What other pronouns even are there?' I missed his vein so he had to get stuck twice," she had written.
Following the outrage, the university briefly suspended the medical student without announcing any other action. Fox News reported that in a recent statement, the university claimed that Del Rosario deferred the second attempt at drawing blood from the patient.
"Our documentation verifies that after the student physician was unsuccessful in obtaining the blood draw, the student appropriately deferred a second attempt to one of our certified professionals. The student did not attempt to draw blood again," the school wrote.
The statement also included an apology letter from the medical student. "For the event mentioned in the tweet, I was performing a blood draw on a patient and during our conversation they had shown dismay at my pronoun pin," Del Rosario stated.
"I calmly shared my thoughts about pronouns and did not escalate the situation further. When I was doing the blood draw, I missed the first time due to my inexperience as a student, and per our policy, my supervisor performed the successful blood draw the second time. During this encounter, I never intended to harm the patient. I am truly sorry for poorly representing our school and our health system. I will reflect on responsible social media use as a professional and my duty to care for all my patients, regardless of any differences of belief," she concluded.
Outrage on Social Media
Despite the University giving a clean chit to its medical student and Del Rosario issuing a public apology, it drew a widespread criticism on social media.
"@wakeforestmed is an absolute disgrace! Kychelle Del Rosario...the main line in the Hippocrates Oath: "I will abstain from all wrong-doing and harm, especially from abusing the bodies of man or woman, bond or free," tweeted a user.
"If true, you need to bar Kychelle Del Rosario from working with your patients. They deserve much better care than she can provide. Medicine isnt a social experiment where professionals determine the quality of help they provide based on what their ideologies are. UNNACCEPTABLE," read another tweet.
"Dean Julie Freischlag - Med Student Kychelle Del Rosario stuck patient 2x on purpose drawing blood in protest for criticism of pronouns - 1st Rule of Medicine = Physician do no harm! You are racist and need to be fired!! Shame of Wake Forest School of Medicine!!!" expressed a user.
