News Anchor Says Doctor Dismissed Her Chest Pains Ahead of ‘Nightmare’ Health Scare

MSNBC anchor Yasmin Vossoughian’s misdiagnosis could have resulted in her death. Vossoughian explained on air that she was missing from the show because she was “dealing with a little bit of a health scare.” Her chest pains started on Dec. 20 and lasted for 10 days, according to a clip published by the network earlier this week. “I wasn’t sure what to make of it, but as it continued to get worse I started to think something was actually wrong,” she said. In her description of herself as “a pretty healthy person,” Vossoughian noted that she runs seven miles multiple times a week, is vegetarian, practices yoga, doesn’t smoke, and used to drink “occasionally” but no longer can due to a doctor’s order.

She visited a nearby urgent care center to get help on Dec. 30 and was diagnosed with reflux. “I didn’t really buy it,” she admitted. “But I was relieved it wasn’t my heart. My body though, was pretty certain not to believe the reflux.” She was hospitalized the next day due to her “reflux. “I woke up with severe pains both in my chest and my left shoulder. It was like a tightening in my chest. I took deep breaths that got worse when I was laying flat. I knew enough in that moment that it could mean, could is the key word here, that I was having a heart attack, especially because it was on the left part of my shoulder.” The doctor diagnosed her with pericarditis, which she described as “inflammation of the lining of my heart” caused by a “common cold.”

After spending multiple nights in the hospital and getting excessive fluid removed from her heart, she was released. “I bounced out of the hospital. I couldn’t get out of there fast enough with the hopes I was on the mend. But that was not the end.” Three days after feeling a flutter in her heart, she was admitted to the hospital for myocarditis, a condition she described as “inflammation of the actual heart muscle.” Vossoughian was hospitalized for five days for treatment and testing, noting, “it was just the cold that was doing all of this. It had caused all of this inflammation around my heart.” She hopes she is on the path to a full recovery, although she will remain on medication for the foreseeable future.