FAIRFIELD, Calif. (CN) – A Kaiser member went to the emergency department with acute chest pains two times in six months and was sent home with a misdiagnosis of constipation, she says.

Shirley Galathe sued The Permanente Medical Group, Inc., Kaiser Foundation Hospitals, Inc., Kaiser Foundations Health Plans, Inc., and Adriane Nguyen, M.D., for professional negligence and gross negligence in her Solano County Superior Court case.

Galathe says she was transported to the emergency department at the Kaiser hospital in Vallejo in September 2016 with acute chest pain. She was told she had constipation and given treatment, which did not alleviate the pain.

In March 2017, she again sought treatment for acute chest pain and was again provided with treatment for constipation, according to the action.

Three days later, she was finally diagnosed with acute chorlecystitis, a painful inflammation of the gall bladder, “which required immediate surgery,” the suit states.

Galathe says she should have been properly diagnosed on her first visit in September 2016, but the defendants “demonstrated a substantial lack of concern for whether plaintiff was suffering from a significant medical ailment.”

The misdiagnosis and eventual surgery “has left Ms. Galathe with severe scaring, trauma, emotional distress, anxiety, stress, general malaise and fatigue,” according to the action.

Galathe seeks economic and noneconomic damages, interest and legal costs. She is represented by Marquis D. Owens of the Owens Law Firm in Hayward, California.