Hepatitis C Exposure Lawsuit Filed Against Employment Company

A Kansas area woman has filed a lawsuit against Maxim Staffing Solutions and several other medical institutions, alleging that they failed to take steps that could have prevented her from becoming infected with hepatitis C while receiving treatment at a hospital where a former medical technician who carried the disease was working. 

According to allegations contained in the complaint, 70 year old Linda Ficken contracted hepatitis C after undergoing treatments at a hospital where David Kwiatowski was working. Kwiatkowski has been charged separately with infecting at least 31 people with the disease, while working at more than 10 hospitals after contracting hepatitis C.

Between 2008 and 2010, Kwiatowski reportedly stole narcotics, injecting himself with many of the drugs and refilling the syringes with saline for later use on other patients, which exposed them to a risk of developing a hepatitis C infection.

According to documents filed in the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, a coworker at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) Presbyterian in Pittsburgh saw Kwiatkowski stuff syringes filled with narcotics down his pants in 2008. Later, more syringes were found in his locker.

The hospital gave Kwiatkowski a urine drug test. He tested positive for morphine and another pain killer, fentanyl. The documents claim UPMC fired Kwiatkowski and turned the case over to Maxim Staffing Solutions, which originally hired Kwiatkowski. While Maxim fired Kwiatowski, neither the staffing company or the hospital turned the case over to legal authorities.

Medical Solutions LLC of Omaha, Nebraska subsequently hired Kwiatkowski to work at Hays Medical Center in Kansas. There he came into contact with Ficken, who was at the hospital undergoing a heart catheterization in 2010.

After information was discovered about Kwiatkowski’s activities, Ficken was contacted by Hays Medical Center about the possible infection and tested positive for hepatitis C earlier this year, prompting her hepatitis C infection lawsuit. She asserts that three medical institutions allowed Kwiatkowski to continue working with patients, exposing her and others to a risk of the disease.

The lawsuit also alleges Medical Solutions hired Kwiatkowski to work at Hays medical Center without performing the correct background checks on him.

A similar hepatitis scare surfaced at a Colorado hospital in 2009, after a surgical technician stole injections of fentanyl, a powerful pain reliever and opioid, for herself, and then used the dirty needles to inject patients with saline solutions.

The hospital employee in that case, Kristen Diane Parker, did so knowing that she had hepatitis C, which she likely contracted from using dirty heroin needles. Thousands of former patients at several facilities where Parker previously worked were required to undergo testing for hepatitis and other blood borne diseases.

Hepatitis C is a viral disease that leads to the inflammation of the liver and can cause Cirrhosis and liver cancer. Symptoms include abdominal pain, dark urine, fatigue, fever, jaundice, nausea and vomiting.