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A health care laundry oversight group that accredited the linen vendor embroiled in two wrongful death lawsuits connected to the UPMC mold crisis said Tuesday that its standards are extensive and rigorous.
“Those standards deal with processing health care laundry in the safest manner possible for patient safety, staff safety and employee safety,” said Gregory Gicewicz, past president of the Healthcare Laundry Accreditation Council and owner of Sterile Surgical Systems laundry in Tumwater, Wash.
Gicewicz said the council is aware of a report that surfaced last week as part of two lawsuits against Paris Healthcare Linen Services in DuBois.
“Because of an ongoing investigation and litigation going on, we're not going to comment further,” he said.
Whether there is an investigation remains in question.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, , is not taking any further action. Neither is the Pennsylvania Department of Health.
Pittsburgh attorneys Brendan Lupetin and Jerry Meyers represent the families of organ transplant patients Che DuVall, 70, of Perryopolis, and Daniel Krieg, 56, of St. Marys, in lawsuits against UPMC and Paris. The attorneys claim post-operation rhizopus fungal infections killed both men at UPMC Presbyterian and Montefiore hospitals.
Two other similar lawsuits against UPMC on behalf of organ transplant patients who died after contracting mold settled for $1.35 million apiece. The family of an unnamed 47-year-old West Virginia man who died after post-operative complications from a fungal infection has not sued.
Lupetin added Paris as a defendant without objection from UPMC last week after he received a May 2, 2016, internal UPMC report regarding its linen supplier. UPMC hired Andrew Streifel, a hospital environment specialist with the University of Minnesota's department of environmental health and safety, to investigate Paris Healthcare Linen Services.
As part of the investigation, Streifel inspected a linen cart delivered by Paris to UPMC Montefiore on Feb. 2. Samples showed “heavy fungal growth” of rhizopus on the “wet sheets collected from the UPMC laundry carts,” he wrote Onbahis in the report. He also found rhizopus mold at the Paris facility and on its roof.
The CDC, which did not determine an exact source of the mold, appears to have dismissed the UPMC internal report.
Just 11 days after Streifel submitted his report to UPMC, the CDC published a final report about the mold crisis visit but didn't mention his report.
“CDC was provided a copy of the report late last spring or early summer,” CDC spokesman Thomas Skinner said Tuesday in an email to the Tribune-Review. “Our epidemiological information gathered during investigation did not lead investigators to DuBois.”
He continued, “If linens were involved most likely there would have been cases more widespread throughout facility and more cutaneous infections. CDC targets environmental investigations when there is likely an epidemiological link. As spores can be cultured from the environment quite readily, it is important to target testing based on investigation of cases.”
According to its website, the council accredits more than 200 laundry facilities. The accreditation is active for three years. Paris' accreditation expires in December 2018.
“To its health care customer, a laundry with HLAC accreditation possesses a kind of credibility that is instantly recognizable and highly attractive,” the council wrote on its website.
Lupetin said he is not criticizing the council's standards.
“It's good they have standards,” he said. “Paris is being called into question by Mr. Streifel's report. He visited the facility and saw what it looked like.”
Last week, Streifel told the Trib he was surprised after his February 2016 inspection that Paris gained accreditation. Paris, in a statement, said it could not comment during ongoing litigation.
Of the CDC's position, Lupetin said, “We expect further developments to demonstrate further-reaching aspects of this outbreak.”
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