Bronchoscope Infection Lawsuit Lawyer

The FDA has been raising concerns about reusable bronchoscope contamination for years. In 2015, the agency issued a safety communication warning health care providers about the risk of infection from reprocessed flexible bronchoscopes. In June 2021, the FDA updated that warning after reviewing more than 860 medical device reports describing contamination or infection connected to reusable flexible bronchoscopes from multiple manufacturers, including Olympus. The organisms named most often included Mycobacterium, Pseudomonas, Serratia, and Klebsiella. The agency also recommended that facilities consider sterilization instead of high-level disinfection when feasible, and consider a single-use bronchoscope for higher-risk patients.

The Alvarez Law Firm treats those communications as background for a free review, then compares them to one patient's chart. An FDA warning or import alert is not, by itself, proof of any individual claim.

The June 24, 2025 FDA import alert blocked 58 Olympus endoscope models from entering the United States, and bronchoscope models were included in that list. An import alert is one of the strongest tools the FDA has against a foreign device maker: U.S. Customs is authorized to detain every listed product at the border until the manufacturer can prove it is safe.

In addition to the import alert, the FDA has issued separate Class I recalls — the most serious recall category — for bronchoscope-related parts and accessories from Olympus. A Class I recall means there is a reasonable probability that use of the product will cause serious injury or death.

In June 2023 the FDA identified a Class I recall of certain laser-compatible Olympus bronchoscopes, including the BF-1TH190, BF-H190, BF-Q190, and BF-XT190, after reports of airway fires and burns during procedures that also used a laser or argon plasma coagulation. The hazard in that recall is combustion, not infection. It does not establish that a later pneumonia or sepsis came from a contaminated scope.

The infection question is separate: narrow channels that are hard to dry, organisms such as Pseudomonas and Mycobacterium, and the cultures from one patient. Duodenoscope cases, which turn on the elevator channel rather than the airway, are covered on the ERCP scope infection lawsuits page.

For the full timeline of FDA actions across all Olympus scope categories, see the FDA warnings page.

A bronchoscope has a long, narrow working channel and small movable parts. Those spaces are difficult to brush, rinse, and dry. Moisture and organic material left behind can form biofilm, a slick layer that shelters bacteria from high-level disinfection. Whatever survives can be delivered into the next patient's airway.

The public record includes a specific Olympus example. In the early 2000s, Johns Hopkins Hospital traced a large Pseudomonas aeruginosa outbreak to a loose biopsy-port cap on Olympus flexible bronchoscopes. Investigators found a part that could twist open and trap bacteria where routine cleaning did not reach. The findings were published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2003. The hospital contacted more than 400 patients who may have been exposed. Roughly 100 tested positive. Exposure was reported to have possibly contributed to the deaths of three patients, and Olympus recalled the affected devices. That outbreak is background for a review. It is not proof of any later patient's claim.

A longer plain-English walkthrough of the FDA update and that biopsy-port defect is on our page about the FDA bronchoscope warning and the design defect. The same cleaning failure, seen from the hospital's side, is covered under hospital reprocessing negligence.

A bronchoscope infection lawsuit lawyer at The Alvarez Law Firm reads that device history against one chart: which model was used, how it was reprocessed, and which organism grew afterward. The FDA file and a past outbreak do not decide the claim.

The Alvarez Law Firm reviews bronchoscope claims nationwide. A bronchoscope infection lawsuit lawyer looks for the pattern below. Matching several points is a reason to request a free review. It is not a promise that you qualify or will recover.

• You had a bronchoscopy at a U.S. hospital, surgery center, or pulmonology clinic.
• Within days, weeks, or months after the procedure, you developed a serious lung infection — pneumonia, lung abscess, mycobacterial infection, or sepsis.
• You required IV antibiotics, hospitalization, ICU care, or additional procedures to treat the infection.
• The cultures from your sputum, blood, or lung tissue identified Pseudomonas, Mycobacterium, Klebsiella, CRE, or another drug-resistant pathogen.
• Your filing window under your state's law has not yet closed. The filing-deadline page explains the discovery rule that often keeps older cases alive.

Even if you do not know which scope was used, that gap does not end a review. Identifying the make and model is part of what The Alvarez Law Firm looks for in the hospital's device and procedure records, including a formal request under HIPAA's right of access. A review is not a promise that a claim will be filed or that you will recover.