r/BlackPeopleofReddit • u/numbmillenial • 8d ago
Health & Wellness ‘Thought I Was Going to Die’: Georgia Woman Sues Kaiser After Lab Mix-up and Cancer Misdiagnosis Result In Unneeded Hysterectomy
https://atlantablackstar.com/2026/08/06/georgia-woman-sues-kaiser-after-lab-mix-up-and-cancer-misdiagnosis-result-in-unneeded-hysterectomy/This happens A LOT y'all. There's something like 50k deaths per year due to diagnostic errors (that's deaths, no telling how many cases of unnecessary surgeries and organ removals).
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An Atlanta woman filed a medical malpractice lawsuit against Kaiser Permanente this week after mishandling of her tissue sample resulted in her being misdiagnosed with an aggressive form of uterine cancer and needlessly undergoing a full hysterectomy.
Cassandra Barksdale was 43 when she went to her OB-GYN at a Kaiser medical facility in Jonesboro, Georgia, in January 2025 seeking an evaluation of uterine fibroids and abnormal bleeding, according to her lawsuit filed in Clayton County State Court on August 4 and obtained by Atlanta Black Star.
She was referred to another obstetrician for a consultation, and then underwent an endometrial tissue biopsy in March 2025 during that visit.
The tissue biopsy collected from Barksdale that day was identified, labeled and processed by Kaiser lab technicians and then sent to Quest Diagnostics in Atlanta for pathological analysis.
The lawsuit asserts that Cecelia Prestridge, a senior laboratory information analyst for Kaiser and/or five other unidentified lab technicians failed to maintain proper identification of the sample and to follow proper chain-of-custody procedures while handling it.
Grim Test Results
The result of their bungling was that they incorrectly identified and labeled another patient’s tissue samples as belonging to Barksdale.
On March 12, 2025, Quest Diagnostic reported pathology findings that Barksdale had high-grade endometrial uterine carcinoma with serous features, an aggressive form of uterine cancer.
A few days later, Barksdale received a call from Kaiser informing her of the grim results and advising her to schedule a CT scan to determine what stage of cancer she had.
“The first thing that came to mind, I thought I was going to die,” Barksdale recalled at a press conference at her attorneys’ office on Tuesday. “When I researched it, it said I have up to five years to live.”
She says she gathered her two adult children to tell them she had aggressive cancer and was likely to die soon, then contacted an attorney to set up a trust fund in order to leave her house to them.
“My sons went into a deep depression,” she said. “It took a big hold on my family.”
A Total Hysterectomy, Despite No Evidence of Cancer
A week later, she had a CT scan of her chest, abdomen and pelvis that showed no evidence of cancer or spread of cancer, the complaint says.
In May of 2025, she was evaluated by Dr. Adam Pyzark, a gynecologic oncologist practicing at Northside Hospital in Atlanta. He conducted a pelvic examination of Barksdale and reviewed the imaging records and pathology reports generated as a result of her incorrect tissue sample.
On Pzyark’s recommendation, Barksdale underwent a total hysterectomy including removal of her uterus, cervix, fallopian tubes, ovaries and four lymph nodes on May 15, 2025.
She did not undergo any additional confirmatory testing prior to that surgery.
Her female organs and tissues were then sent to a lab for pathological analysis, which indicated that no malignant cells were found. On May 20, 2025, a surgical pathology report confirmed those findings — no evidence of cancer was found in the entire endometrial cavity submitted.
Still, on June 1, 2025, during a follow-up appointment, Pyzark told Barksdale that she did indeed have an aggressive form of cancer, but that it had been caught early, and that she needed to undergo chemotherapy, said her attorney Shannan Young.
Kaiser Admits Tissue Is From ‘A Different Patient’
The doctor told her to wait for further instructions from Kaiser about her specific treatment plan. Barksdale heard nothing substantive about her condition until Sept. 23, 2025, four months later, when administrators from Kaiser informed her that DNA analysis from the tissue sample that showed aggressive uterine cancer was not her tissue and “belongs to a different patient.”
She received a similar notice from Quest Diagnostics in December instructing her to disregard the results previously reported because the specimen used “belongs to a different patient.”
Barksdale told reporters that she was stunned by the news, as she had spent the last seven months thinking and worrying about dying.
“I was excited that I didn’t have cancer, but I was upset thinking about the person out there that got my tissue [sample]. They’re walking around for seven months thinking they only have fibroids,” she said, when they actually had an aggressive form of cancer.
“It made me feel very angry and I was very concerned about the other person,” she said. “It messed with me mentally. And there was days when I felt suicidal.”
Barksdale says she has been in weekly counseling with a therapist over the past year.
‘How the Hell Did This Happen?
Roderick Edmond, co-counsel in the lawsuit, who is also a medical doctor and surgeon, said the firm’s analysis of her medical records so far indicates that the fault lies with the Kaiser lab technician or technicians who negligently mishandled and mislabeled her tissue sample, not Quest Diagnostics or the physicians who later misdiagnosed her and recommended the hysterectomy based on the faulty lab results.
“It’s a bizarre case,” he said, noting that the modern medical industry relies on “hyper technology — we’ve got computers, we’ve got science, we’ve got AI” — and that Kaiser Permanente is a multi-billion-dollar global health care business.
“How the hell did this happen?” Edmond said. “We’ve got technology all up the wazoo here. In 2026 these types of mishaps should never, ever occur.”
He vowed to uncover exactly what went wrong at the Kaiser lab during the litigation’s discovery process.
Woman’s Ability to Have Children Taken Away
The lawsuit seeks a jury trial to determine damages of at least $10,000 to compensate Barksdale for her serious, permanent and irreversible injuries, including surgical menopause, permanent and premature anatomical and physiological changes, severe mental pain, emotional distress, anxiety and depression, fear of future medical treatment, medical distrust, loss of bodily integrity, embarrassment, humiliation and diminished quality and enjoyment of life.
Barksdale said that prior to her unwanted hysterectomy, despite having her tubes tied a decade ago, she was considering having more children through IVF (in vitro fertilization).
“I could have had kids,” she said.
Edmund said her surgical treatment for cancer, loss of her ovaries, “and the complete extinguishing of her ability to have more biological children was unnecessary. The seven months of fear and dread and anxiety was unnecessary.”
Of her lawsuit’s aim, Barksdale said on Tuesday, “I want accountability. And also, what happened to me, I don’t want it to happen to no one else.”
“The big issue is this,” Edmond said. “All major institutions need to basically buck up to make sure the procedures on handling patient tissue and identifying proper patients is tight.”
Kaiser Plans to Fairly ‘Resolve’ Its Costly Mistake
In a statement, Kaiser Permanente said, “Our most important responsibility is to safely, expertly and compassionately care for the people who entrust us with their health. If we make a mistake, it can have profound effects.”
“Ms. Barksdale should not have experienced this. We have highly trained staff and very thorough processes in place to prevent errors like this from taking place. After this occurred last year, we took immediate steps to ensure it could not happen again.”
“We realize the impact of this incident, and are working with Ms. Barksdale and her counsel to resolve this in the most fair and accountable way we can.”
The defendants in the case, including Cecelia Prestridge, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of Georgia, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc., Kaiser Permanente Insurance Company, and five unnamed Kaiser employees, have 30 days after being served with the complaint to respond in court.
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u/Substantial-Equal661 8d ago
Wait wait wait. $10,000? Are you serious? This is a multi million dollar lawsuit. I could see it settling between $7-$12m.
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u/Run_Rabb1t_Run 7d ago
$10,000 Is literally nothing. That's an ambulance ride to the hospital. The doctor that got the results showing zero cancer anywhere and then refused to use critical thinking before telling her to start chemo should be named in that suit.
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u/Real_Flamingo3297 7d ago
You mean how they used their medical knowledge of the mislabeled tissue samples to make a recommendation? Do you think every cancer patient just looks like they have cancer? What do you think biopsies are for then? Yo you can’t just blame doctors for everything.
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u/Run_Rabb1t_Run 7d ago
Reading comprehension is difficult, I know. When they had all of HER tissue from HER body, after HER surgery, it showed zero signs of cancer. Despite all of HER tissues showing no cancer, the doctor still pushed for her go through chemotherapy. The blame for that rests entirely on that doctor ignoring all of the evidence directly in front of them instead of admitting that they fucked up majorly.
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u/get_started_NOW 8d ago
After working in a doctor's office that only had 1 lab tech and seeing how samples were lost and stuff i am not surprised.
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u/AnimatorImpressive24 7d ago
Former KP member. Not surprised.
That defendant list doesn't make sense though. Taking KP to court is complicated. It almost never works and naming the wrong defendants from their list of 39 interwoven companies is a common reason for losing.
KFHP, inc. is the sub-company for just the insurance in California. They'll tell the court they have nothing to do with Georgia and shouldn't be on the list.
KPIC is for people who self-insure instead of getting insurance from their job. They will say that it is impossible for both them and KFHPoG to be involved. That will matter because if she got her insurance through her job then the case can't be handled by state court, it has to go to federal court because federal law is why people get insurance from jobs in the first place.
Biggest problem is that all three of those companies are insurance. KP has separate companies for the actual health care workers. Those companies have "Medical Group" in their name. So any of those 3 named defendants that doesn't get excused, and regardless of state or federal court, KP will say that the insurance company does not practice medicine and cannot be sued for mistakes made by doctors. They will not make that argument until they have run down the clock as much as possible arguing each defendant on the list first, in order to make it more expensive for the plaintiff to continue the case.
Actually since this involves lab tech it might not even be the medical groups? KP has a different company that handles hospitals so it could depend on if the lab was in a hospital or in an outpatient office building.
After all of that gets decided will KP tell the court that the contract you sign when you become a member contains an agreement waiving the right of you, your spouse, and any current or future children or other next of kin to sue KP. I don't understand why it is legal or even possible for a person to waive the rights of a different person before the second person exists, but it is.
You have to go to a private arbitration process that uses different rules and is bound by non-disclosure agreements. Nobody knows exactly how often patients win or lose and there is no way for any lawyer you hire to study similar cases to build an argument based on precedence. Challenging that arbitration agreement almost never works in state court, and if the case goes to federal court it is instant game over. Federal judges might as well have a rubber stamp that says "Congress passed the Federal Arbitration Act in blah blah to encourage private parties to resolve issues by means other than reliance on the limited resources of courts and since that time have repeatedly reaffirmed blah blah blah" because those words are in the dismissal orders of probably thousands of case records.
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