DNA tests reveal men were switched at birth in North Dakota hospital

Kyle Bylin and Jeremy Morrison sued Unity Medical Center in Grafton, North Dakota, after DNA testing showed they were switched at birth 38 years ago. Both men were born there on Jan. 26, 1988, and were apparently the only two babies delivered at the hospital that day.

Bylin uncovered the mismatch after taking an at-home DNA test he picked at random during a Christmas gift exchange. That test led him to a biological aunt through a genealogy platform, and Morrison later had his DNA tested as well. The results tied the two families together in a way that left no serious doubt the babies had been exchanged in the newborn period.

The lawsuit seeks more than $50,000 in damages and is aimed at more than money. It places the hospital’s record-keeping, newborn identification procedures and old maternity ward safeguards under scrutiny nearly four decades after the error. Unity Medical Center has said there is no evidence staff were responsible for the switch, a central factual dispute as the case moves forward.

The consequences reach far beyond the courtroom. A swap at birth can alter identity, family bonds and medical history for life, leaving parents to learn they raised a child who was not biologically theirs and leaving the men involved to rebuild their personal history from the start. Bylin and Morrison’s discovery also shows how consumer DNA testing and genealogy matching have changed old family mysteries from rumor into evidence.

Cases like this are harder to hide now than they were in 1988, when hospitals relied on paper records, wristbands and staff checks that could fail without immediate detection. Modern DNA testing has made it possible to expose mistakes that once might have remained buried for life, but the lawsuit in North Dakota shows that a single error in the nursery can still carry legal, medical and emotional consequences across decades.