Britt Jones
A couple from Texas were left with a huge bill after a cruise vacation turned into a nightmare.
Khiali Baxter was enjoying her first-ever time on a Royal Caribbean cruise with her boyfriend when things took a turn for the worst.
Baxter became violently ill just two days into the journey from Galveston to Mexico, leaving her floating 'in and out of consciousness'.
However, this was just the start of what was to come.
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“So, I woke up. I started vomiting up blood, unfortunately, and I had passed out on the ground,” she said in an interview with KHOU. “I could feel myself kind of going in and out of consciousness. I was very cold and terrified.”
During her ordeal, she was transported to the emergency room on board the ship, where they found she was suffering from a gastrointestinal bleed that had led to her hemoglobin levels to drop to critically low levels.
According to a GoFundMe for Baxter, the bleed was active, and she was in life-threatening danger.
Baxter, ‘one of the youngest police officers in America’, had to wait four hours on the ship before it docked at Costa Maya, where she was able to be taken to a hospital in Mexico.
However, Baxter claims that the ambulance passed other hospitals in order to take her to a 'private and very specific hospital'.
She explained that as soon as she arrived via the ambulance, they 'demanded $2,500' just to examine her.
From there, the costs just kept mounting.
While her parents were contacted and asked for payment so the hospital could treat her, according to her father Craig, they told him they would only 'work as far' as the deposit would take them.
“I've never heard this in my life,” he said.
Thankfully, they were able to slow her bleeding and perform an endoscopy and colonoscopy, but Baxter claims they left her for nine hours before providing her with blood and attempting to investigate her medical issue.
However, when they couldn’t find the cause of the illness, she was released from the hospital’s care.
The family then received an itemized bill of $9,970 from the hospital, and a $4,048 bill from the cruise ship for onboard medical expenses.
They say they have 'no idea' where the $9,000 figure came from.
They also had to spend money on emergency passports, flights and housing in Mexico, racking up their total expenditure to a significant extent.
The reason for the bills? Baxter did not have travel insurance, and now she regrets her choice.
“It was a very, very scary experience, and my main thing that I do want to say is that I really wish I would’ve gotten travel insurance,” Baxter said.
Yet, she, nor her family have any idea as to what caused her bleeding and she’s still in a state of crisis.
Her father said of the incident: “It was an eye-opening experience that I hope prepares other young people.”
As for Baxter, she says to 'please make sure you have travel insurance' if you are traveling outside of the US, adding: “I can't tell you how much I wish I would have had it. I'm a law enforcement officer and I'm a proud servant of my community, if it could happen to me it could happen to anyone.”
In an update on Facebook, Baxter was allegedly medically evacuated, with the help of Assist America, which brought her back to the United States.
Baxter reportedly returned home on September 20, but has no diagnosis to help her understand what happened to her.
Among the stress, her family have to wade through the expensive bill, but thankfully, the GoFundMe has recovered 99 percent of the costs at the time of writing.
UNILAD reached out to Royal Caribbean for comment.