Jury orders Olympus to pay hospital $6.6 million but rejects claims scopes are unsafe

A jury ordered Olympus Corp. to pay a Seattle hospital $6.6 million in damages tied to a deadly superbug outbreak, and told the hospital to pay $1 million to a deceased patient’s family, according to an article on the Los Angeles Times website.

But the jurors rejected claims that the company’s flagship medical scope was unsafe as designed.

The case was filed by Theresa Bigler, 61, and her four children in connection with the August 2013 death of Richard Bigler, a pancreatic cancer patient who contracted an infection linked to a contaminated Olympus TJF-Q180V duodenoscope. 

Virginia Mason Medical Center later joined the suit against Olympus, but the jury found it shared some blame in the case.

Read the article.