After an internal audit finds frozen embryos may have been mis-labeled, Ochsner halts all operations at its Elmwood Fertility Center.
A St. Charles Parish couple is alleging an Ochsner employee "mislabeled, mishandled and improperly stored their embryos," and now they've filed a class action lawsuit.
The lawsuit filed in Jefferson Parish in July names "Ochsner Fertility Clinic" and "Vince Williams" an embryologist who was employed at Ochsner, as defendants.
It lists Heather and Duane Hebert as plaintiff's.
Attorney Kara Samuels, who represents the Hebert's, says the couple was unable to conceive on their own in 2006.
They completed an in vitro fertilization cycle at Ochsner in 2007.
Later last year, the Hebert's allege they were notified of something that went terribly wrong.
Samuels says, "that the facility had mis-labeled and mishandled the two remaining embryos such that they couldn't distinguish my client's embryos or genetic material from another couple's."
Like a lot of other couples who undergo this procedure, the Heberts thought they had the option of having more children after the first embryos produced a successful pregnancy.
The suit says Ochsner alleges that the Hebert's embryos were being stored in the same canister as another couple's, but that it cannot determine which embryos to belong to which couple.
Even if Ochsner could determine with 100 percent certainty parentage through genetic testing, the Hebert's still cannot use the two embryos.
The suit says "the Hebert's embryos did not receive appropriate screening for sexually transmitted disease."
Today, Ochsner's top brass announced it was suspending the in vitro program.
CEO of Ochsner Health System, Dr. Patrick Quinlan, says, "during this process we have become deeply concerned about the reliability of the overall IVF program itself and have hired independent experts to complete this work."
Hospital administrators say an internal audit will review records going back several years.
In the meantime, Ochsner says there is no evidence of any embryo being mistakenly implanted.
