Former Patients Join the Legal Posse on the Trail of Theranos

Case: Nine ex-patients filed a class-action lawsuit against Theranos and its erstwhile retail partner Walgreens seeking damages for the harms they allegedly suffered as a result of inaccurate tests performed using Theranos diagnostic technology. The Arizona federal court dismissed seven of the claims but allowed the remaining 13 to proceed in a class action, which is currently in the evidence discovery phase.

Significance: Up to now, the Theranos case has been mostly about money and the financial losses suffered by consumers, investors and business associates as a result of the firm’s overhyped bloodless finger prick technology. But the patient class action is a poignant reminder of the human and patient safety dimensions of the story. The alleged victims’ accounts set out in the court papers document harrowing tales of mental suffering and unnecessary testing and treatment as a result of false positives for disorders like the autoimmune disease, Sjörgen’s syndrome and the thyroid condition known as Hashimoto’s disease, not to mention the patient removed from blood thinner medication warfarin on the base of flawed Theranos test results. At its peak, Theranos operated 40 consumer test centers within Walgreen’s in the metro Phoenix area, performing over 1.5 million blood tests for nearly 176,000 consumers.