DaVita Agrees To Pay $383.5 Million in A Wrongful Death Case

DaVita Agrees To Pay $383.5 Million in A Wrongful Death Case

Introduction

One of the largest dialysis providers, DaVita Inc., recently agreed to pay $383.5 million to the families of three patients who died of cardiac arrest following dialysis treatment at DaVita's. The Denver-based company was ordered to compensate for the wrongful death by a Denver jury in June 2018. The compensation included $125 million in punitive and $1.5 million to $5 million in compensatory damages.

DaVita was blamed in the lawsuit filed by the families for not forewarning about the health risks of GranuFlo treatment which caused toxic pH imbalances and alkalosis in the patients. Attorneys representing the plaintiffs asserted that the dialysis provider was aware of the toxicity of the product. Granuflo lawsuits were centralized in the District of Massachusetts as a multidistrict litigation in 2013 (MDL No. 2428; In Re: Fresenius GranuFlo/NaturaLyte Dialysate Litigation) before Judge Douglas P. Woodlock.