Parents were notified about a Nurse Assist saline solution recall a month after their son died of septic shock and cardiac arrest, after the contaminated SteriCare product was used on his wounds.
The family of a 26-year-old man has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against SteriCare Solutions, Nurse Assist and various medical providers, alleging he died from an infection caused by a contaminated sodium chloride solution, which was recalled a month after it was used for wound cleaning and irrigation.
The complaint (PDF) was brought in California Superior Court on November 5, pursuing claims on behalf of Kameron Sohrabian and his parents, Babak Sohrabian and Mojgan Homaie. The lawsuit names the manufacturer of the recalled sodium chloride solution, Nurse Assist, LLC, along with Byram Healthcare Centers, Inc., SteriCare Solutions, City of Hope, Dr. Nicole Karras, Nurse Practitioner Lisa Gutierrez, and several unnamed individuals, as defendants.
Sohrabian was a cancer survivor who was diagnosed with lymphoma in 2016, and underwent a bone marrow transplant at age nineteen, according to the lawsuit. However, in the years following his transplant, he developed a chronic condition known as lymphedema, which causes wounds and infections around the legs.
During the course of his treatment for lymphedema at City of Hope hospital, healthcare workers prescribed four bottles of SteriCare 0.9% sodium chloride saline solution to treat his wounds, which was manufactured by Nurse Assist and supposed to be a sterile product. However, the lawsuit claims that Sohrabian began experiencing signs of a worsening infection immediately after using just the first bottle of the sodium chloride solution.
"These side effects included extreme pain, abnormal swelling throughout his entire body, a change in skin color to a purple or blue tint, and pain on his wounds and infections that were not getting better," the lawsuit states. "On or around November 12, 2023, Decedent's pain became intolerable."
His parents called 911 and he was taken to the hospital, where he went into septic shock, then cardiac arrest, and died that same day. They later learned that the product may have become contaminated with harmful bacteria due to a packaging seal defect, which could have compromised the sterile barrier.