› $150,000,000 verdict in personal injury case
A growing number of people are becoming afflicted with an incurable, man-made disease that is related to a common medical procedure performed every single day in this country, a KCRA 3 investigation has found. Sarah Fracella is one the victims.
If she knew then what she knows now, Sarah Fracella would not have undergone an MRI. “I don’t think there’s been a day in the last, probably, two years that’s gone by that I haven’t cried at least once about this,” said Fracella, 38, of Santa Barbara, whose skin is hardening painfully into something that looks startlingly like marble.
An elderly man has sued several major health companies, claiming the dyes used to scan his failing kidneys caused a rare, painful and incurable disease. Peter Gerber, 72, of San Rafael, contends that injections of dyes containing the heavy metal gadolinium caused him to develop nephrogenic systemic fibrosis, or NSF. Also known as nephrogenic fibrosing demopathy, the disease can thicken the skin, stiffen joints, restrict movement and potentially lead to death if it affects internal organs.
