It was supposed to be a routine visit to a medical clinic.
But for one Maryland mother, it was anything but. She says the staff didn’t believe the child with her was her daughter because her daughter is black and she’s white.
As if a mid-week visit to the urgent care wasn’t bad enough, Karen Dresser says matters were made much worse.
“At first, I was just numb,” Dresser said. “I was in disbelief actually.”
She says her 12-year-old daughter was denied treatment at a Patient First in Waldorf, Maryland because workers there didn’t believe she was the child’s mother.
Dresser is white and her adoptive daughter is black.
“We are a family in every sense of the word and for somebody just to make the assumption that we weren’t is hurtful,” Dresser said.
Dresser was so stunned that she went to Facebook and posted a question to see if any other mothers were turned away or asked to produce guardianship papers during a visit to the clinic.
“And by the time I was home, I had lots of people saying no. Never never never,” Dresser said. “So I know it was a color issue.”
In a statement, Patient First wrote, “During registration, if a minor patient is accompanied by an adult who states that they are the patient’s parent, we take them at their word. If the adult states that they are the child’s guardian, we require documentation to confirm that before the patient can be registered.”
But Dresser says she insisted that she was the child’s mother.
She says workers need to be better trained on how to handle these kinds of situations.
“I think people out there need to understand that families come in all shapes and sizes and that it’s important to respect all families,” Dresser said.
Dresser says she wrote the clinic’s corporate office a letter and did receive an apology.