Claudia Presăcan's Olympic "adventure"

What happens when someone is diagnosed with a serious case of anemia? Normally, they are hospitalized to receive immediate treatment, and they take time off work. If your name happens to be Claudia Presăcan, you get a pat on the back, and you're shipped off to Sydney to compete in the Olympics When the gymnastics delegation arrived from Deva, ready to take off for Sydney, the only thing missing were the gymnasts' physicals. Team doctor, Ioachim Oană didn't even bother to make an excuse, such as "I left them [the papers] at Deva because we were in a hurry to get to Bucharest." No. The gymnasts were not given a physical; it's as simple as that. They were leaving for the Olympics, declared ready by the infallible eye of Dr. Oană, who thought all six gymnasts were healthy and all ready to compete. Blood tests? Very simple matter for the ever-wise team doctor. "We'll do them now. They're just a formality anyways...we don't have any (health) problems." Things weren't quite as simple, and that was fairly obvious to everyone else. Claudia Presăcan was extremely pale, with deep dark circles underneath her eyes. "Training sessions, nerves, traveling from Deva to Bucharest", Dr. Oană dismissed any concerns. The shocking news came back once the simplest blood was performed. The poor girl had a red cell (hemoglobin) count of 6.3!! This, when the normal range is around 11-14%. A patient is declared anemic when the red cell count drops below 9, and for counts under 7%, they should be hospitalized. When the count drops below 6.5%, blood transfusions are recommended immediately. Obviously, another blood test was performed right away, as is the case when tests reveal any serious problems, but the result was identical. What could be done? In order to clarify a few things for our readers, and to show the seriousness of the situation, we include the opinion of two doctors. Both of them work outside sports medicine, and we presented the case to them, without telling them who the patient was, and asked them what would be the correct medical procedure in this situation.

Copyrighted photo by Gymbox

Dr. Anca Marinescu, general practitioner from a hospital in Bucharest said "First of all, a second test should be performed. Once the red cell count has been confirmed, the patient should be hospitalized as soon as possible. Further tests should be performed to determine the cause of the low hemoglobin count. Most of the time, anemia is not a disease, it is caused by another disease which is yet undiscovered. Especially in this case, when the count is so low, you have to take into account all factors. Sometimes, the patient won't be able to stand up, if it is an acute form of anemia that sets in unexpectedly. If the patient is able to walk, and does not report and major problems, this means the anemia developed gradually, and affects the entire body."

Dr Florentina Vlădăreanu, a blood transfusion specialist from Bucharest adds "Once a patient is hospitalized, we investigate the causes and developments of the anemia. We look especially for things that might be somewhat hidden, such as ulcers, or another diseases, which could turn out to be extremely serious. We also have to check for possible hereditary problems, something like a benign form of thalasemy. Following this diagnosis, we recommend various treatments based on the type of anemia, like iron supplements..."Both doctors were very worried, once we explained this was a real case, and they recommend immediate treatment, under medical supervision, and a hospital stay.

The ensuing panic meant the team doctors of the entire Romanian delegation were unable to act professionally. Their worries and fears about Claudia's well-being were overridden by organizational red-tape. The plane tickets were already bought, and the team was set to leave that very night...then the team would have been missing a key member. Based on Dr. Oană's previous record, the coaches left alternate Andreea Ulmeanu behind. How could you miss taking part in a competition were you were favored to win the gold medal? When all these factors were taken into account, the delegation doctors were under immense pressure to make a decision. After numerous debates, they formed a commission --basically, their way of dividing responsibility. Dr Drăgan, head of the medical delegation of the Romanian team had a hard time finding members for his so-called commission, who decided to assume responsibility and approve the current team members. "We were afraid, not just for Claudia's health, but she could have had an attack in Sydney, which would have made public this huge medical mistake", said one of the doctors, who despite numerous threats, refused to sign Claudia's medical papers. "Thankfully, the crisis didn't take place. That's the last thing we needed..."

Eventually the commission got an approval. Sick as she was, Claudia got on the plane to Sydney. She was given shots of iron supplements, and Dr. Oană was told this was no longer something he could ignore, as he did with the gymnasts' blood tests. He needed to continue giving her shots, and monitor her reaction to the treatments closely, by giving her regular blood tests to see how she's responding to the improvised treatments. But our renown team doctor wasn't going to change his work ethic in Australia. Instead he stuck to the same methods that worked for over 20 years. According to his declarations, shots were followed by iron pills, then Nurofen..."who knows", he wondered. In the end, Claudia did the unthinkable and performed well enough to help the Romanian team win gold. At least after the competition ended, the next logical -actually, mandatory- step should have been giving her another blood test, and once they got home, to have Claudia undergo medical tests to determine the cause of her anemia. Yeah right...The same infallible eye of Dr. Oană decreed everything was alright. Why bother and complicate things further by going to a medical lab? Fact remains, when we last talked to the brilliant Dr. Oană, on October 9th, he didn't have the slightest idea what Claudia's red blood cell count was. He had finished (was he ever finished...) working in the sports medicine field. Now it's up to the RGF and the Romanian Olympic Committee to look at our sports heroes as...people. And, as such they have no right to risk their future well-being, or their life.

Update: Claudia told me she is doing well, going to school part time, and still trying to understand how this happened.

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