(NEW YORK) — An emergency room doctor is opening up about “one of the most interesting cases” she’s seen in her career so far and, in the process, warning people about wire grill brush injuries.
Dr. Meghan Martin, a pediatric emergency medicine physician at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida, opened up about the case in a Feb. 18 TikTok post and since then, it’s gone viral, garnering over 34 million views in less than two weeks.
“One of the most interesting cases that I’ve had to date was a 4-year-old boy who was at a barbecue eating when he suddenly grabbed his ear and started crying, complaining of ear pain,” Martin said in her two-minute video.
Martin, who aims to share accessible pediatric health information on social media, went on to describe how she and other doctors responded to the case and eventually unraveled the medical mystery.
“We did a [CT scan] of the neck, which included the ears with contrast, and we did a ton of labs, gave him fluids, just did every test that we could think of doing. And we got our answer on the [CT scan],” she continued.
In an interview with ABC News’ Good Morning America, Martin said the case stretched over several days because doctors had first thought they had an idea of what was going on.
“One of the things that I didn’t share in the TikTok was that the initial complaint was actually a bee sting to the ear and that was one of the reasons that we were focusing on that area so much,” she said.
Martin and her team figured out the culprit of the boy’s pain had been a metal piece of a wire from a grill brush that had somehow found its way into the food he had eaten.
“We ended up seeing a small foreign body in the neck that was a grill brush wire and it had created a little abscess around itself because it was a small foreign body in the neck,” Martin explained. “We consulted the ear, nose and throat surgeon who was able to remove it successfully and the kid recovered beautifully. But in the end, we found out that that grill brush had been in the hamburger that he’d been eating at the time.”
The boy was able to make a full recovery after surgery and treatment, according to Martin, who noted the case was one she saw a couple of years ago and was the first case she saw where a wire injury affected the neck area.
Although Martin called this incident an “exceptionally rare case,” she added that she’s seen at least three similar cases as an ER doctor and recommends that people consider avoiding metal grill brushes completely, if possible.
“When it comes to grill brushes, there are multiple safe options on the market right now,” Martin said. “There are wooden grill brushes, there are ones that are like sponges or scrubbers, there’s even sprays that you can use and then just wipe off the grill. So there are lots of other opportunities to clean your grill, rather than using these [wire brushes] that can be dangerous.”
In addition, Martin suggested people get checked by a medical professional if they experience any pain or other symptoms after eating food off a grill.
“If anyone is eating something that just came off the grill and all of a sudden they have pain, or maybe in the next couple of days they develop some symptoms … they’re vomiting, they have really bad abdominal pain, it is something to think about to get an X-ray or some other imaging modality that can check to see if there was a piece of a wire that was lodged in the food that they ate,” Martin said.
(NEW YORK) — A major cross-country storm that first brought blizzard conditions to California is now heading to Nevada and Arizona before taking aim on the South.
In the wake of the storm, Yosemite National Park is buried under 15 feet of snow and is closed indefinitely.
Near Lake Tahoe, California, an avalanche buried the first two stories of a three-story apartment building Tuesday night. No injuries were reported, according to the Placer County sheriff.
In San Bernardino County, California, where some residents are stranded, officials said Wednesday, “Our No. 1 priority is to get our residents the food, the medicine and access that they need. Plowing is going to continue over the course of the next several days.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday declared a state of emergency in 13 counties hit by the severe winter weather and activated the California National Guard to help support operations.
As the storm marches east, winter storm warnings are in effect north of Las Vegas and extend to the Mexican border.
Tucson, Arizona, is under a winter weather advisory. Tucson residents could get the same amount of snow that New York City saw on Tuesday.
This storm then will move into the Heartland, bringing a severe weather outbreak on Thursday and Friday.
First, an enhanced risk for severe weather has been issued from Texas to Tennessee, where very large hail, damaging winds and strong tornadoes are possible through the evening.
Then comes the major threat on Thursday when strong tornadoes are possible and winds could top 70 mph. Cities in the bull’s-eye on Thursday include Dallas, Little Rock, Texarkana and Shreveport.
Heavy rain could lead to flash flooding from Oklahoma to Tennessee.
This severe weather moves into the southeast on Friday, with Alabama, Georgia and the Carolinas in the storm zone.
By Friday afternoon, that same storm system will bring snow or a wintry mix from Chicago to New York City, and heavy rain to Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia.
(CHICAGO) — A Chicago police officer was shot and killed Wednesday while responding to a call about a person with a firearm, according to the Chicago Police Department.
The officer was shot multiple times while exchanging gunfire with a suspect, Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown said during a news conference Wednesday evening.
The officer, who was on the force for five years, succumbed to his injuries at Mt. Sinai Hospital, the superintendent said.
The suspect, who police say is an 18-year-old, was shot in the head and is critically injured, Brown added.
Police said the suspect only had a single prior violation before Wednesday’s shooting.
“Every officer in this police department, and for that matter, every officer in this country is grieving today,” Brown said.
“If you see an officer tonight, or the next day, or the day after that, thank them for their service,” Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who was also at the press conference, said.
(LOS ANGELES) — A couple has filed a lawsuit against a California-based fertility clinic alleging the clinic transplanted an embryo with a cancer mutation during in vitro fertilization, despite the couple specifically cautioning against it.
Melissa and Jason Diaz allege in their lawsuit, filed this week in Los Angeles, that the fertility clinic they used, HRC Fertility, has a “tragic pattern” of using genetic material like eggs, sperm and embryos “in a manner contrary to its patients’ instructions” and concealed material information from its customers.
The Diazes claim that, in their case, less than one year after their son was born, they discovered he had the CDH1 mutation for hereditary diffuse gastric cancer, a genetic disease that increases the risk for a specific form of stomach cancer known as diffuse gastric cancer, according to the National Institutes of Health.
Five years ago, in 2018, Jason Diaz, then 32, was diagnosed with diffuse gastric cancer and had to undergo chemotherapy, followed by a gastrectomy, or stomach-removal surgery. Genetic testing later confirmed that Jason Diaz, who has a family history of gastric cancer, carried the CDH1 mutation, according to the lawsuit.
Jason Diaz said in a news conference Wednesday that he and his wife specifically chose to undergo IVF to have children in order to have testing that would help them avoid passing the CDH1 mutation to their child.
“I wouldn’t want anyone on earth to experience this type of pain and now I will be forced to watch my own son, my own flesh and blood, go through this after Melissa and I worked so hard to protect him,” Jason Diaz said. “Every day my heart is hurting for my baby boy, knowing the pain and challenges he has ahead of him.”
The Diazes say they told the clinic and the doctor named in the lawsuit, HRC Fertility and reproductive endocrinologist Dr. Bradford A. Kolb, that they had chosen IVF to prevent having a child with the CDH1 mutation. According to the lawsuit, the couple also had their embryos screened for the BRCA-1 breast cancer mutation, which Melissa Diaz carries.
“Dr. Kolb knew from the time of his first visit with them, on December 12, 2018, that they intended to avoid passing on this rare mutation for stomach cancer,” the lawsuit states. “Jason and Melissa’s genetic counselor sent reports regarding testing for the specific mutations directly to Dr. Kolb in 2019.”
The couple claim in the lawsuit that Melissa Diaz had her eggs retrieved in 2020, and those eggs were used to create embryos that were tested for the CDH1 and BRCA-1 genes.
In August 2020, according to the lawsuit, Kolb transferred one embryo that did not have either mutation, but that pregnancy ended in a miscarriage.
In January 2021, Melissa Diaz underwent a second embryo transfer, which resulted in the birth of her son. The Diazes were told that embryo did not have the CDH1 gene, when records later showed that it did, according to the lawsuit.
“HRC [Fertility] told us that we had one male embryo that had my BRCA-1 mutation and not the stomach cancer mutation,” Melissa Diaz said in the news conference Wednesday. “That embryo was going to be our plan B because the BRACA mutation causes breast and ovarian cancer, so the likelihood of it negatively impacting a boy was significantly less than a girl.”
She continued, “So in January 2021, we informed HRC that we wanted to proceed with the male embryo that HRC told us only had the BRCA-1 mutation.”
The couple claim in the lawsuit that they discovered the alleged error last July, when Melissa Diaz received a copy of her embryo report as they prepared for another embryo transfer for a second child.
“To her horror, Melissa also recognized the first embryo — clearly designated as carrying the mutant allele for hereditary diffuse gastric cancer — as the embryo transferred on January 8, 2021,” the lawsuit states. “Embryo #1 had become her beloved infant son.”
The Diazes claim in the lawsuit that HRC Fertility later presented them with “falsified records” that covered up handwritten notes showing which embryo had been transferred.
“HRC Fertility’s falsified records from October 2022 are evidence of HRC Fertility’s knowledge of and intent to hide its misconduct,” the lawsuit states.
The lawsuit also states that HRC Fertility later provided the records that included the handwritten notes in December 2022.
The Diazes say they have simultaneously filed an arbitration claim regarding the wrongful transfer of the embryo.
The lawsuit announced this week is aimed at what is described in the complaint as “HRC’s fraudulent concealment of material information to its customers — more particularly, the fact that HRC Fertility has a long history of misusing its customers’ biological material, in direct contradiction to its customers’ instructions.”
“Moreover, it concealed that its processes and procedures are insufficient to prevent such grave errors,” the lawsuit states. “Had it made such disclosures, Jason and Melissa never would have entrusted HRC Fertility and Doctor Kolb with their genetic material.”
The Diazes are suing for monetary damages and injunctive relief and are seeking a trial by jury, according to the lawsuit.
In addition to HRC Fertility and the couple’s medical provider, Kolb, one additional HRC Fertility employee, identified as the clinic’s IVF coordinator, is also named in the lawsuit.
HRC Fertility told ABC News in a statement it “stands by the professionalism and expertise of our medical staff.”
“At HRC Fertility, our mission is to provide world-class care to all our patients struggling with parenthood. The family planning journey requires many difficult choices. We take all of our patients’ choices and concerns very seriously and are committed to providing the highest quality of care,” the statement said. “We deeply empathize with this family’s situation. However, the patients associated with the case sought genetic testing and genetic counseling outside of HRC Fertility, and with an outside party; they wished to have a male embryo transferred, which we carried out according to the family’s explicit wishes and in accordance with the highest level of care.”
“At HRC Fertility, our mission is to provide quality and compassionate care to all our patients struggling with parenthood and we understand that family planning requires many difficult choices,” the statement continued. “We offer a variety of fertility procedures so all families, regardless of challenges, can have the opportunity to become parents. We have successfully helped thousands of individuals, couples and families become loving parents, including the patients involved in this story.”
“We also stand by the professionalism and expertise of our medical staff and pride ourselves on adhering to the highest standards for patient care, patient records, results, and testing at all our locations,” the statement added. “Since 1988, we have remained dedicated to helping hopeful parents build families through assisted reproductive technology, compassion, expertise, innovation, cutting-edge research and personalized care.”
Melissa Diaz said Wednesday she and her husband are hopeful they will have a second child, but will be on guard more through the process.
“I’m very scared and nervous to go through it again to try to have a second baby, but this time, I will ask my questions. I will double check,” she said. “It’s heartbreaking that it had to come to this, but just be aware of what’s going on with your own body, what they’re trying to do with your body.”
If you take a walk down “Memory Lane” with Old Dominion, the CMA and ACM Group of the Year winners remember it all, going back to the very beginning.
So was there a moment on the bus when it crystallized for the songwriters that they could succeed as a band?
“We lived in a van for so long with each other that we realized that if we could live in a van, we could live in a bus,” lead singer Matthew Ramsey recalls.
“There was NO moment that crystallized for me in the van,” Brad Tursi jokes.
“Yeah, not in the van,” Matthew agrees. “There was a moment crystallizing in the van when we were like, ‘If we have to do this for one more year, there’s no way we will make it. We need a bus!'”
But Matthew can remember when he sensed things starting to change.
“We were in this, like, rehearsal space, I think it was at the union, the musicians union, and we were working through ‘Break Up with Him,’ and there was something in that,” he reflects. “I remember, like, texting [writer/producer] Shane McAnally saying, ‘Hey, you gotta come down here and hear what we’re working on.'”
“And there was something in the room that day that felt very different and special. So I definitely remember that,” Matthew says.
“Break Up with Him” would go on to become their very first #1 in 2015.
“Memory Lane” is the lead single from the band’s forthcoming fifth album.
(NEW YORK) — One baby got a special homecoming parade three months after he was born weighing only 1 pound and 15 ounces.
Samantha Desmond, 28, of Peabody, Massachusetts, was only 25 weeks pregnant, her baby roughly the size of a head of cauliflower, when her water broke — nearly three months before her February due date.
“It was a healthy pregnancy, up until it wasn’t,” Desmond told ABC News’ Good Morning America. “My water broke while I was at work. I didn’t know what was happening, but surely I wasn’t thinking that [my water broke] because I was only six months pregnant.”
Desmond said she drove herself to Salem Hospital before being rushed by an ambulance to Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
“The best case scenario would have been me staying [in the hospital] for three months,” Desmond said. “The longer he stayed in my belly, the safer it was going to be for him, right? Well, I only lasted three days.”
Baby Mateo was born on Oct. 28, 2022, and was immediately placed in intensive care. Desmond said she and her husband Marsid Jakic would visit their baby boy every day.
“He’s spent Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, all of the holidays in the NICU, and the nurses would make posters for him and take pictures, and they just really made every day special,” said Desmond, who said they would travel 30 to 40 minutes every night after work to visit their son. “Every single night, every holiday, every day, just doing our best.”
Finally, after months of visits and family holidays spent in the hospital, the couple got the good news: baby Mateo could come home.
“I said to myself, ‘He can’t just come home simply. He needs a big entrance,'” Desmond said.
Desmond said she was inspired by her husband’s Albanian traditions to set up a homecoming parade. So she reached out to her friends, Det. Andrew Greenberg and his wife, Officer Sam Doherty, who both work at the Peabody Police Department, to see if they could help, and he quickly set up a police escort for Mateo on Feb. 20.
“As we’re coming down every street that we came down, every intersection was blocked off. It wasn’t just one police escort. It was the entire day shift,” Desmond said. “As soon as [other officers] got word of what was going on, everybody wanted part of it. And they’re all waving. It was beautiful.”
Peabody Police Lt. David Bonfanti said Sgt. Michael Bettencourt and the entire patrol team sprung into action to help a community member who had been through so much.
“Well, you know, we’re all fathers and mothers first. You think of what that family is going through and we can take literally three minutes out of our day, to make something special for a family that’s gone through so much. They were excited,” Bonfanti said. “They were able to make a positive […] impact on a community member for the city.”
Now, Mateo weighs more than 9 pounds and 13 ounces and is enjoying life at home. Desmond said she is beyond grateful for all of the support her family has received.
“[Mateo] has been so strong and has overcome everything that came up,” she said. “I make this joke constantly, but he was literally just done cooking. He did not need [40 weeks] and he’ll prove it for the rest of his life.”
(NEW YORK) — Human skeletal remains found deep in a wooded area of Pennsylvania has been identified by authorities as belonging to Christopher Story, a man who suddenly and mysteriously went missing almost 10 years ago.
Christopher Story was last seen around 11:00 p.m. on Aug. 11, 2013, at his residence in New Castle, Pennsylvania — a town located just over 50 miles north of Pittsburgh.
“He was last seen wearing a white t-shirt, khaki shorts, a dark ball cap, and black shoes,” read the FBI missing person’s statement released in 2013. “He left behind his wallet, phone charger, and medication.”
At the time of Story’s disappearance, the FBI warned that he “has surgical pins/rods in his spine and may walk with a limp” and that, since he didn’t have his medication, Story “may appear agitated and may also appear confused or suffer hallucinations.”
However, on Wednesday, the New Castle Police Department confirmed that human skeletal remains found in Taylor Township — less than five miles away from where Story went missing — belonged to the man who had been missing for more than nine years.
“The NCPD has continued to aggressively investigate this case since that date attempting to find Chris Story and determine what happened to him,” said the New Castle Police Department following the discovery.
The Coroner’s Office and the New Castle Police Detective Bureau along with assistance from the FBI and K9 cadaver dogs managed to recover the skeletal remains over the past several weeks, authorities said.
“After examining the remains and looking for certain medical characteristics and comparing X-rays, Coroner Richard ‘RJ’ Johnson notified the detectives and New Castle Police that the remain are those of missing person Chris Story,” the NCPD confirmed on Wednesday.
Story’s family has since been notified of the findings and that their loved one has been found, police said.
The investigation into what happened to Story and how he died is still ongoing and the coroner has not made a ruling on the cause or manner of death, the NCPD said in their statement released to the public on Wednesday.
Story’s remains will now be sent out to the FBI for forensic testing and police say they are still actively investigating his death.
Brian Tyree Henry is a cover star, earning placement on the cover of Essence‘s recently launched biweekly online cover story series, Of The Essence. During the interview, he discusses his motivation, delves into some past characters, and even tackles the importance of therapy and mental health.
Brian has portrayed a range of characters throughout the years, earning an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Causeway. Playing James Aucoin, he said, “came at a time in my life where I needed to find a reflective surface in order to figure out a lot of parts of the pain and grief I was going through in my own personal life.”
“There was something about him that really tapped into me dealing with the grief I was carrying in my life and the non-confrontational way that I chose to approach it by actually just wallowing in it,” Brian continued. His role as Alfred aka Paper Boi on Atlanta also helped him deal with grief after the loss of his mother.
“He allowed me an opportunity to truly vent, and to truly lay some of those burdens down in a way that I hadn’t really been able to with other characters from my past,” he explained.
While acting has had a positive effect on his healing process, Brian says he never wants to confuse it for therapy.
“This is therapeutic, but therapy is therapy,” he said of portraying different characters. “And I want to encourage as many people as possible, especially Black people, to go to therapy.”
“There is nothing weak about feeling. There’s nothing weak about being a Black man who asks for help, or who actually doesn’t know the answer to how to get on the other side,” he added.
Kevin Kane/Getty Images for The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
The seventh annual Love Rocks NYC benefit concert is happening next week at the Beacon Theatre in New York City, but if you can’t make it to the Big Apple you can still enjoy the show.
For just $20, fans will be able to stream the concert, which features a lineup that includes James Taylor, Pat Benatar and Neil Geraldo,Sheryl Crow, the John Mayer Trio, Warren Haynes and R&B legend Mavis Staples.
The annual concert is a benefit for God’s Love We Deliver, which delivers meals to New Yorkers who are unable to shop or cook for themselves. That $20 livestream ticket will translate to two meals. To date the concerts have raised more than $25 million. This year the charity expects to deliver more than 3 million meals, which are provided free of charge.
Will Smith took the stage at the African American Film Critics Association Awards, where he and Emancipation director Antoine Fuqua accepted the organization’s Beacon Award. It marked Smith’s first in-person speech at an awards ceremony since the 2022 Oscars, where he slapped Chris Rock onstage.
“Emancipation was the individual most difficult film of my entire career. It was all outdoors, that is true,” Smith joked, drawing laughs from the crowd, according to Variety.
“It was the second day of shooting and 110 degrees…I was in a scene with one of the white actors. The actor decided to ad-lib. So we’re doing the scene. I did my line. He did his line. And then — ad-lib — he spit in the middle of my chest,” Smith recalled generating groans from the audience. “The actor felt that the ad-lib had gone well. So we do take two. I do my line. He does his line — and spits in the middle of my chest again…In the distance, I hear a voice. And Antoine says, ‘Hey, let’s do a take without the spit.’ And in that moment, I knew that God was real.”
“I want to thank [AAFCA co-founder Gil L. Robertson] and AAFCA. I want to thank all of you in this room for doing what you do, keeping our stories alive,” Smith continued. “I want to thank Apple because the budget was one thing. And then the budget was another thing. And then the budget was another thing. And Apple never flinched. It was the first time I had heard from a studio that the story was more important than how much it costs to get it done…They make iPhones. They can do it.”
