A Northeast Ohio woman just spent fifteen days in a burn unit despite the fact she’d never been burned. Instead, she experienced a rare, severe reaction to a medication she’d just been prescribed.
Kimberly Cannon feels thankful she went to the emergency room when she did, “my insides and my outsides were on fire,” said Cannon.
Surrounded by her sisters, Cannon is happy to sit on her living room couch after spending 15 days in the Akron Children’s Hospital Burn Unit.
“I keep looking at the pictures of me all wrapped up, and I’m like that was really me under there, like I really almost died,” said Cannon.
Cannon said she had recently been prescribed Lamictal. According to the Cleveland Clinic, the drug can be used to treat epilepsy and mental health disorders.
“It was just some sort of reaction to the Lamictal. It’s now on my allergy list; now they were like, just tell every provider you’re allergic to Lamictal,” said Cannon.
The reaction was a very rare, serious skin disorder called Stevens-Johnson syndrome.