Mistakes During COVID-19 Vaccine Shots Can Cause 'Excruciating Pain' That Needs Surgery

Mistakes made during the administration of vaccines, such as those for COVID-19, may result in excruciatingly painful injuries that can only be remedied through surgery.

Hundreds of people across the country have said that they were injured during the administration of the COVID-19 vaccine, News 4 Nashville reported.

Among them was Jessi Clark, a nurse from Bowling Green, Kentucky, who described the injury she sustained as a "burning, radiating pain."

Indiana mother Whitney Surane, meanwhile, claimed the pain she experienced was worse than childbirth.

"I have given birth five times without any medicine. And it was worse than that pain," the Chesterton resident said.

Angela Houston, from Wake Forest, North Carolina, said she was brought to her knees due to the "excruciating pain" of the injury she sustained from receiving the shingles vaccine.

The injuries were due to the vaccines being given too high in the shoulder joint instead of the deltoid muscle, Clark said.

The nurse said she immediately knew something was wrong as she "felt a crunch and a pop" during the administration of her vaccine.

"[I] looked at another nurse beside me and said, 'Pretty sure I got my injection way too high,'" Clark said.

The resulting inflammation and lingering shoulder pain, often referred to as shoulder injury related to vaccine administration (SIRVA), can only be repaired through surgery, according to vaccine injury experts.

The condition is difficult to diagnose as doctors are often unfamiliar with the injuries, according to Vivien Cord, who administers a SIRVA Facebook page for injured people.

However, Dr. Marko Bodor, an interventional spine and sports medicine specialist who has also become one of the U.S.' top researchers on SIRVA, said that the medical community was becoming more and more aware of the condition.

Despite their experiences, Clark, Surane and Houston were not anti-vaccine.

"This was not the vaccine that did this. This was the administration of it," Clark explained.

People who are injured by COVID-19 vaccines are not eligible for compensation under the Health Resources and Services Administration's National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, but they can claim benefits from the agency's Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP).

So far, 227 people have filed for COVID-19 countermeasure claims because of SIRVA, according to the CICP website. However, the agency has reportedly not compensated any COVID-19 claim, with three claims being denied because "the standard of proof for causation were not met and/or a covered injury was not sustained."

The best way for a person to protect themself is to pull up their shirt and never pull it down to expose as much of the deltoid muscle as possible and not the shoulder, according to vaccine experts.

People are also advised to put their hands on their shoulders and cover up their shoulders when they are getting vaccinated.

The U.S. has reported a total of 77,837,693 COVID-19 cases and 920,097 virus-related deaths, data provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed.