In 2020, Tiffany Score and Steven Mills placed their faith in a Florida IVF clinic that promised “compassionate, advanced fertility care tailored to each unique journey.”
Five years later, the south central Florida couple welcomed a daughter named Shea, only to discover that the baby Tiffany had carried and delivered was genetically another couple’s child.
The catastrophic mix-up at the Fertility Center of Orlando has since exposed a clinic accused of sloppy laboratory practices, a doctor facing multiple lawsuits, and a $6 billion fertility industry critics say remains dangerously under-regulated.
For Score and Mills, the realization came after their newborn daughter looked visibly different from both of them.
A genetic test confirmed what had become impossible to ignore. Shea was 100 percent South Asian and shared no DNA with either parent.
If Shea wasn’t theirs, Tiffany and Steven feared another couple may have had their baby
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
The mistake traced back to the couple’s treatment at the Fertility Center of Orlando, a Longwood clinic led by reproductive endocrinologist Dr. Milton McNichol.
In 2020, McNichol created three viable embryos using Score’s eggs and Mills’ sperm.
The embryos were supposed to remain tied to the couple who had created them. According to their lawsuit, they were stored in labeled straws, placed in a petri dish to be rehydrated, moved to an incubator, monitored, and then implanted.
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
In April 2025, after an earlier transfer attempt had failed, Tiffany was implanted with what she believed was one of those embryos.
Nothing during the pregnancy gave the couple reason to question what had happened inside the clinic.
They prepared for Shea’s arrival like any other expectant parents, buying diapers, nursing pads, and everything else they thought they would need for the baby they had waited years to meet.
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
When Shea was born on December 11, however, the first sign that something had gone terribly wrong was visible immediately.
The baby did not look like either parent.
“It is obvious,” attorney Jack Scarola later said.
Genetic testing confirmed that Shea was not related to Score or Mills. She was biologically another couple’s child.
The result created a second fear. If Shea was not theirs, one of their embryos may have been implanted in another woman, and another family could already be raising their biological child.
The couple filed a lawsuit against the clinic after the establishment “ghosted” them
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
After Shea’s birth, Score and Mills reportedly tried to contact the clinic repeatedly.
When answers did not come, they went to court.
In January 2026, the couple filed an emergency lawsuit against IVF Life, Inc., the corporate entity doing business as the Fertility Center of Orlando, and McNichol personally.
The complaint accused the clinic of transferring the wrong embryo through negligence or laboratory mishandling.
It also accused the clinic of using “ad-hoc handwritten labels” on containers holding eggs, sperm, and embryos.
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
For Score and Mills, the lawsuit was not only about damages. It was also about finding Shea’s biological parents and determining what had happened to their own embryos.
The couple said they loved Shea and wanted to raise her, but also recognized that her genetic parents had a right to know what had happened.
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
“While we are profoundly grateful to have Shea in our lives and love her immeasurably, we also recognize that we have a moral obligation to find her genetic parents,” Score wrote in a public Facebook post on January 29.
“Our joy over her birth is further complicated by the devastating reality that her genetic parents, whom we do not yet know, or possibly another family entirely, may have received our genetic embryo. We are heartbroken, devastated, and confused.”
The virality of the case forced the Fertility Center of Orlando to close operations in May
Image credits: FOX News
As the case gained attention, the Fertility Center of Orlando acknowledged that an error had occurred.
“We are actively cooperating with an investigation to support one of our patients in determining the source of an error that resulted in the birth of a child who is not genetically related to them,” the clinic said in a statement that was later deleted from its website.
“Multiple entities are involved in this process, and all parties are working diligently to help identify when and where the error may have occurred,” the statement continued. “Our priority remains transparency and the well-being of the patient and child involved.”
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
But the public statement did little to stop the scandal from widening.
By late March, IVF Life was already telling patients to “transition their care to CNY Fertility.”
The Fertility Center of Orlando then announced that it would close operations on May 20, 2026, after “thoughtful consideration.”
The notice encouraged patients to continue treatment with CNY Fertility, adding that they would “continue to see many of the same trusted and familiar faces” from their care team.
The closure came after the embryo mix-up turned the clinic into the center of one of the most alarming IVF scandals in recent years.
It also came as McNichol’s own history began to draw scrutiny.
Dr. Milton McNichol has a controversial history including bankruptcy and multiple lawsuits
Image credits: Fertility Orlando
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
The Fertility Center of Orlando was owned by McNichol, who has been licensed to practice medicine in Florida since 2004.
In 2024, the Florida Board of Medicine reprimanded him and ordered him to pay a $5,000 fine after a routine inspection found several violations at the clinic.
Those violations included equipment that did not meet current performance standards and missing risk management documents.
That same year, the clinic filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Court records showed the business was later reorganized, but its outstanding debts had not been discharged.
Image credits: fertilityiq
The embryo mix-up was not the only case involving McNichol and the Fertility Center of Orlando.
Last year, a Seminole County man sued McNichol and the clinic after alleging that his frozen sperm had been damaged or destroyed.
The man had provided the specimen for cryopreservation before undergoing cancer treatment that could impair or destroy his fertility.
According to the lawsuit, the damage or destruction of the sperm caused the man and his wife “to lose the opportunity to conceive biological children together.”
Score and Mills eventually found Shea’s biological parents, leading to a custody dispute
The discovery of Shea’s biological parents turned the medical error into a custody crisis.
Score and Mills had raised Shea from birth. The biological parents had also been patients at the same clinic and had been trying to have a child of their own.
Shea was genetically theirs, but she had spent the first months of her life with Score and Mills.
In June, court documents revealed that the two couples had reached a “mutually devised custody agreement.”
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
Under the agreement, Score and Mills would continue raising Shea as their daughter.
The couple also said they intended to build “a relationship of friendship and trust” with Shea’s biological parents.
Scarola said the publicity around the case had helped connect both families and settle the fear that Shea could be taken away.
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
“Tiffany and Steve recognize the public interest in the details of their IVF experience, and they appreciate the role the news media has played in bringing them and Shea to the point where Shea’s genetic parents were able to be identified and fears about Shea’s future have been settled,” he said.
The biological parents’ identities remain confidential.
“I wonder how often mix-ups like this happen?”
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