A common medication put a woman in a coma and damaged 95 percent of her body

36-year-old Khaliah Shaw, living in the USA, suffered a severe illness that completely changed her life after taking a common medication. Her skin began to peel off, and 95 percent of her body was severely damaged. Years later, she nearly experienced the same situation again after taking an antibiotic.

Khaliah was working full-time and a part-time job while studying for her master's degree. Due to the heavy workload, she sought help from a psychiatric center for emotional distress. There, she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and prescribed the drug Lamotrigine.

Although the medication had a positive effect on her mental state, severe complications appeared in her body a few weeks later. When she woke up from sleep, she saw the skin around her eyes and lips peeling off. It was later revealed that she had developed Stevens–Johnson syndrome (SJS) — a severe reaction of the body to certain medications.

The illness, which began in January 2014, initially manifested with flu-like symptoms. The woman's body temperature rose to 40 degrees, and rashes and blisters spread across her entire body. As a result, she was in a coma for 37 days. When she regained consciousness, 95 percent of her body was severely damaged.

Most tragically, subsequent examinations revealed that Khaliah did not have bipolar disorder, meaning she should never have been prescribed this medication at all.

Just when the woman thought this difficult ordeal was behind her, she faced problems again in July 2025 due to a dental infection. The dentist prescribed her the antibiotic Amoxicillin. Khaliah warned him about her previous illness and asked for an alternative treatment, but the doctor dismissed her previous reaction as an allergy.

As a result, the woman took the antibiotic six times over two days. However, soon after, her face swelled up and irritation appeared on her mucous membranes. She stopped taking the medication and went to the emergency room.

"It felt like my body was burning from the inside. I felt like a heated curling iron was burning my internal organs. I didn't want to go through that horror again," Khaliah told the Need To Know publication.

She emphasized that her concerns were not taken seriously enough even at the hospital, and she was offered other medications that had warnings related to SJS. Based on her experience, she notes that there is insufficient awareness about this disease in the medical field.

Later, she was prescribed a lower dose of a different antibiotic to treat the infection. Khaliah also filed a lawsuit against the doctor and the medical institution regarding the previous incident. However, the appeal was rejected last year. According to reports, this was due to the institution and the doctor's affiliation with the state system and rules of legal immunity.

Currently, she is raising funds through the GoFundMe platform to achieve justice.

"When I woke up, I saw a body I didn't recognize. I had to relearn how to walk, eat, and swallow. My whole life changed in an instant. I never fully recovered from that event. Justice was not served in court either. My biggest fear is that one day someone won't listen to me again, and the consequences will be life-threatening," she said.