A woman is suing an Oregon hospital for over $15 million, claiming she was unwittingly inseminated with the wrong sperm during a fertility treatment -- and the family only discovered the massive mistake 43 years later, a report said.
The life-altering mix-up came to light around 2023 when DNA testing revealed the father -- who raised the now-adult daughter -- wasn't genetically related to her, the suit alleges according to a report by Law&Crime.
"[The mother] had to bear the humiliation, discomfort, and physical distress of carrying the pregnancy to term and laboring and delivering a child conceived due to the wrongful use of another male's semen specimen," the filing claimed. "[The father] was stripped entirely of his biological fatherhood of the firstborn child with his wife."
The husband and wife -- referred to anonymously in the suit as C.W. and K.W. -- underwent a fertility procedure at Oregon Health Science University (OHSU) in 1980 and their daughter was born on Dec. 13, 1981, according to the suit filed in Multnomah County Circuit Court on Dec. 26.
"To K.W.'s and C.W.'s excitement, C.W. became pregnant, and she gave birth to baby girl, A.P.," the suit alleged. "[The parents] raised [their daughter] as their biological child never thinking that OHSU and/or Providence had wrongfully inseminated [the mom] with foreign semen during her procedure."
But medical staff "wrongly inseminated" the woman with "foreign sperm," causing the baby girl, or A.P., to inherit "medical issues" from the biological father, the suit said.
Another man, R.W. had also sought treatment with his wife at OHSU a year prior and that couple had a baby. Remaining semen doctors obtained from R.W. for the earlier procedure was then errantly used for C.W. and K.W.’s treatment, the court documents claimed.
The parents were "stripped of the unifying bond of creating shared life" together and they will be "permanently reminded" that their oldest daughter was the result of a medical snafu, the filing claims.
The hospital didn't ensure a "proper chain of custody in multiple regards," which leave questions about whether K.W.'s semen was also mistakenly used to inseminate another woman, the suit suggested.
And it's unclear whether the facility properly vetted R.W.'s sample, "thereby exposing C.W. and A.P. to communicable diseases," the suit alleged.
The hospital tried to "conceal or otherwise deny that they wrongfully inseminated" the woman and "failed to properly investigate and notify its patients of medical errors after being placed on notice of the plaintiffs' claims," the filing claimed.
The father, mother and daughter are each suing OHSU and Providence Health for $5 million in damages and for another $2 million in economic damages.
OHSU said, "In light of patient privacy laws and pending litigation, OHSU cannot comment on this case."
Providence Health deferred comment to OHSU and said, "Providence won't have a comment on pending litigation."