An attorney representing patients who may have lost frozen eggs and embryos due to a malfunction at a University Hospitalsfertility clinic says the extent of the damage may be far worse than originally reported.
Tom Merriman represents some of the affected women and couples, and says he hasn’t talked to anyone yet who has been told their embryos are still viable. Merriman says he will not file a class -action lawsuit. He said he doesn’t think it would capture the emotional toll of what’s happened, recalling one client’s story.
“She was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, and then had uterine cancer. And ... just after she was diagnosed, before she underwent surgery, she ... she went through the process of harvesting eggs and creating embryos and freezing them, and that was her only chance," Merriman said.
University Hospitals is conducting an investigation. It hasn’t said whether human or mechanical error caused the storage tank to malfunction.
