Aleshia Rogers was 27 years old and had just given birth to her third child, Jaxon, by C-section in Lincoln, Nebraska. She was taking ibuprofen twice a day for postpartum pain, something millions of people do without thinking twice.
Three weeks later, she developed a fever, facial swelling, and a rash on her chest. Doctors examined her twice and told her it was conjunctivitis, then scarlet fever. They recommended that she continue taking ibuprofen. Hours later, the skin on her face began to peel off, leaving her unrecognizable.
What she had was Stevens-Johnson syndrome, which progressed into Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis, the most severe form of this reaction. She lost between 90% and 95% of the skin on her entire body, went into sepsis and multiple organ failure, and spent three weeks in an induced coma while doctors gave her between a 5% and 10% chance of survival. She needed full skin grafts and an amniotic membrane transplant in her eyes to see again.
