Dallas Fort Worth Injury Lawyer Blog

Betty Ruth Rhodes, from Illinois, has filed a lawsuit against 65 different companies, alleging that she contracted lung cancer from asbestos exposure.

The asbestos lawsuit was filed in January, in St. Clair County Circuit Court in Illinois. Rhodes, worked as a laborer for several companies from 1958 until 1990, including Borg Warner, Speedway Manufacturing and Rhodes Camper Sale.

Direct and Indirect Asbestos Exposure

Rhodes claims that direct exposure to asbestos at the job site contributed to her developing lung cancer. She also alleges that she suffered second-hand asbestos exposure from her father and husband, who carried fibers home on their clothes or in their hair.

According to the complaint, Rhodes has suffered permanent disability and disfigurement, physical pain, mental anguish, loss of potential earnings and medical costs from asbestos lung cancer. She is seeking compensatory, economic and punitive damages of more than $450,000.

Asbestos Widely Used

Asbestos was widely used in a variety of manufacturing and construction applications, with use peaking in 1973. Most uses of asbestos were banned in the mid-1980s.

Asbestos causes Lung Cancer and Mesothelioma

When inhaled, asbestos fibers can cause asbestosis, lung cancer and mesothelioma. Although the problems have most commonly been seen among individuals who worked in direct exposure, a growing number of lawsuits over second-hand asbestos exposure have been filed in recent years by family members or loved ones who worked around the toxic substance.

Asbestos litigation is the longest running mass tort in U.S. history, with the first case filed in 1929. Over 600,000 people have filed lawsuits against 6,000 defendants after being diagnosed with mesothelioma, asbestosis or other asbestos-related diseases.

Read more here and visit my website for further information.

A group of medical researchers and scientists have determined that the potential risks from metal-on-metal hip implants may outweigh any health benefits provided by these devices.

This is because of higher revision rates are linked to the newer hip replacement designs and the mounting and growing concerns about metal ion blood poisoning, known as metallosis.

The California Technology Assessment Forum (CTAF) has released an assessment of the benefits and effectiveness of using metal on metal hip replacements as an alternative to total hip arthroplasty, and they concluded that the relatively new metal hip implants may not be worth the risk.

The assessment (PDF) is the third time the group has reviewed metal-on-metal hip implants, and the group says that questions and concerns about the technology that were present years ago are still important today.

Because of high revision rates and the risk of metallosis, caused by cobalt and chromium particles shed by metal-on-metal implants, the group concluded that “there is clearly no evidence that the potential benefits outweigh the potential risks.”

After they were introduced, metal-on-metal hip implants accounted for about 1/3 of the 250,000 hip replacements performed each year in the United States. Over the past two years, concerns have increased about metal hip replacement complications, resulting in use of the implants dropping to just 5% of the artificial hip market.

Research suggests that as the metal hip replacement ball and socket grind against each other, microscopic particles of cobalt and chromium are shed into the body, which results in metal poisoning. This metallosis may result in soft tissue damage, inflammatory reactions, bone loss, aseptic and local necrosis that may lead to the need for a hip revision surgery.

In May 2011, the FDA requested artificial hip manufacturers to provide more data on problems with metal poisoning and metal implants.

Attention on the metal-on-metal hip implant risks increased after the DePuy ASR hip recall in August 2010. The DePuy metal-on-metal artificial hip system is no longer available after more than 90,000 components were sold throughout the world.

More than 1,000 people have already filed a DePuy ASR hip replacement lawsuit due to complications caused by the recalled system. These lawsuits have been centralized in the Northern District of Ohio for pre-trial consolidation. To make matters worse, DePuy Orthopaedics additionally faces a growing number of DePuy Pinnacle hip lawsuits filed as a result of problems associated with their other metal-on-metal artificial hip implant. These lawsuits have been centralized in the Northern District of Texas, for pre-trial consolidation. To date a DePuy Pinnacle hip recall has not been issued, and these lawsuits also allege that these older system features similar design defects that increase the risk of early loosening or failure.

As a Plavix Dangerous Drug attorney and Texas medical doctor, I am providing this Plavix litigation update.

Plavix manufacturers Bristol-Myers Squibb and Sanofi-Aventis are calling for the centralization and consolidation of all Plavix lawsuits filed in federal courts throughout the United States on behalf of users of their blockbuster blood thinner who allege that side effects of Plavix resulted in serious personal injuries and even death.

The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation will hold a hearing On December 1, to determine whether at least 13 lawsuits over Plavix filed in New Jersey, New York and Arizona should be centralized before one judge for coordinated handling during pretrial proceedings.

Bristol-Myers Squibb and Sanofi-Aventis are arguing that centralizing the cases before Judge Freda Wolfson in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey would serve the convenience of the parties, prevent duplicative discovery and conflicting pretrial rulings from different judges.

The Plavix suits allege that the drug makers failed to adequately research their medication or warn about the risk of Plavix side effects, which could increase the risk of serious and potentially life-threatening bleeding, as well as a rare blood disorder known as thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP).

In filed opposition statements, plaintiffs gave a number of reasons they feel consolidation would further slow their cases. The plaintiffs argue that the New Jersey cases are advanced in their depositions, and combining them with the cases from New York and Arizona would slow things down considerably. They also claim that the non-New Jersey cases are much newer and will involve recent events, like the FDA’s 2010 black box warning that some genetic traits prevent Plavix from being effective, that are irrelevant to the New Jersey cases.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on March 2010, added a boxed warning to the anti-blood clotting drug Plavix (clopidogrel), alerting patients and health care professionals that the drug can be less effective in people who cannot metabolize the drug to convert it to its active form.

Plavix reduces the risk of heart attack, unstable angina, stroke, and cardiovascular death in patients with cardiovascular disease by making platelets less likely to form blood clots. Plavix does not have its anti-platelet effects until it is metabolized into its active form by the liver enzyme, CYP2C19.

People who have reduced functioning of their CYP2C19 liver enzyme cannot effectively convert Plavix to its active form. As a result, Plavix may be less effective in altering platelet activity in those people. These “poor metabolizers” may not receive the full benefit of Plavix treatment and may remain at risk for heart attack, stroke, and cardiovascular death.

Defendants argue that the cases all involve common fact issues surrounding the drug makers’ research and development of Plavix. They also argue that the timing for consolidation is appropriate, as no single case has reached the phase of depositions of “common” fact and expert witnesses who may have knowledge relevant to all Plavix suits.

Plavix (clopidogrel) is prescribed to prevent blood platelets from sticking together to form clots. It is often prescribed to reduce the risk of heart attacks, strokes and blood clotting when drug coated stents are used in patients with arteriosclerosis and in other at-risk patients.

Plaintiffs allege that they suffered injuries as a result of their unnecessary use of Plavix, such as gastrointestinal bleeding, severe ulcers and a rare blood disorder known as TTP. Some complaints also allege that Plavix did not provide the promoted benefit of reducing the risk of a heart attack or stroke, raising questions about the effectiveness of Plavix among some users.

In November 2009, the FDA issued a public health advisory warning that side effects of Prilosec may interfere with Plavix effectiveness, increasing the risk of heart attack, death or other injuries for patients.

In March 2010, a Plavix “black box” warning was added to alert patients and healthcare professionals that the anti-clotting drug may not work in some patients due to genetics. The FDA indicated that a genetic test is available to determine whether patients are able to metabolize Plavix efficiently and suggested that doctors should consider another medication for at-risk patients who are confirmed to have the gene variant.

Merck said today that a federal court jury in New York found in its favor in the Secrest v. Merck case, rejecting the claim of a Florida woman who blamed her dental and jaw-related problems on her FOSAMAX use.

Chilton Varner of King & Spalding LLP, outside counsel for Merck said, "Unfortunately, the plaintiff had medical problems that cause people to develop the jaw and dental problems that the plaintiff has, regardless of whether they were taking FOSAMAX. She has a long history of invasive dental procedures and suffers from medical conditions that inhibit the body's ability to heal."

Today's verdict marks the fourth time a jury has found in Merck's favor on a plaintiff's product liability claim in the litigation regarding FOSAMAX. The plaintiff in this case alleged she used FOSAMAX and suffered various jaw problems and complications following multiple tooth extractions and failed dental implants.

At trial, Merck presented evidence that FOSAMAX is a safe and effective medication as described in the product labeling that was properly designed and did not cause the plaintiff's dental and jaw problems.

Status of Litigation
This is the fifth case regarding FOSAMAX(R) (alendronate sodium) to go to trial. Merck won three of the first four. The first three trials were conducted as part of the federal multidistrict litigation proceedings before Judge Keenan. The first case to be tried to a verdict, Maley v. Merck, resulted in a defense verdict for Merck in May 2010. The second case to be tried to a verdict, Boles v. Merck, initially resulted in a mistrial in September 2009 after the jury was unable to reach a unanimous verdict. A retrial of that case in June 2010 resulted in a plaintiff verdict, which was later reduced by Judge Keenan. The third case to be tried to a verdict, Graves v. Merck, resulted in a defense verdict for Merck in November 2010. The fourth case to go to trial, Rosenberg v. Merck, which was tried in the Superior Court for Atlantic County, New Jersey, resulted in a defense verdict for Merck in February 2011.

As of June 30, 2011, approximately 1,650 cases, which include approximately 2,050 plaintiff groups, had been filed and were pending against Merck in either federal or state court.

As a DePuy ASR and Pinnacle Replacement and Recall attorney I am providing this blog update.

As readers to my blog will note, I am a licensed Texas medical doctor as well as a product liability attorney. We are currently fielding many phone calls from concerned hip replacement patients and the biggest concern for them is residual hip pain post procedure."Is that normal?" they ask. "How do we know if we are suffering from metallosis?" "My doctor is not concerned but I still feel that something is wrong?"

The answers to these questions remain elusive for several reasons. Firstly and foremost is the lack of research, disclosure and transparency from the hip manufacturers who knew or should have known about these problems and concerns.

Secondary, the orthopedic doctors, many of whom are implanting technicians, they do not have a firm grounding in internal medicine and because of their surgical training do not have the ability to diagnose and treat these types of conditions, short of re-do surgery. They drank the manufacturers kool-aid.

Diagnosis and treatment of metal on metal hip problem requires a multidisciplinary approach including the orthopedic, internal medicine and radiological specialties. Many orthopedic surgeons have reported that tissue surrounding a failed artificial hip looks like a biological dead zone. There are matted strands of tissue stained gray and black and large strips of muscle near the hip no longer contracted. Some patients with all-metal hips, ones in which the cup and ball of a joint are made of metal, said they had trouble finding a doctor to help them.

More than 10 years ago, some researchers had warned that the hips released metallic debris that caused potential health threats to patients. But those warnings were ignored, and now doctors and patients face a mounting public health problem as one of the biggest medical device failures surfaces.

All orthopedic implants, irrespective of their composition, shed debris as they wear, from the grinding action of joints. But researchers say they believe that the metallic particles released by some all-metal hips poses a special threat. This is because scavenger cells released by the body to neutralize the foreign debris convert it into biologically active metallic ions. In some patients, this sets off a chain reaction that can destroy tissue and muscle.

So far, only a small fraction of the estimated 500,000 people in this country who received an all-metal hip over the last decade have suffered injuries. But studies suggest that those numbers will grow and that tissue destruction is occurring silently in some patients who have no obvious symptoms like pain. And that is the crux of the problem, heavy metal blood tests can be normal and yet the hip joint is breaking down silently.

A recent study in England found that all-metal hips were failing early at three times the rate of hips made from metal-and-plastic components. This artificial hips are supposed to last 15 years or more. Most people recover well from a device replacement procedure, but specialists are also seeing growing numbers of patients with complications.

In the first six months of this year, the Food and Drug Administration received more than 5,000 reports about problems with the all-metal hips, according to a recent analysis by The New York Times.

In May, the Food and Drug Administration ordered makers of all-metal hips to develop studies to determine how frequently the devices were failing and the implications for patients. But those studies are not likely to be completed for years.

The final chapter has not yet been written on these metal on metal hips and so far DePuy has only recalled the ASR model. Johnson and Johnson, the parent of DePuy, continues to sell and market their Pinnacle metal on metal hip model.

As a Texas Medical Doctor and DePuy ASR Failure Attorney, I am providing this update and commentary on a recent British database study.

According to a British database, the National Joint Registry for England and Wales, which tracks hip replacement problems, a number of recalled DePuy ASR metal hip implants are failing within six years. Data from the National Joint Registry for England and Wales indicates that 29% of patients who received the DePuy metal-on-metal hip replacement have reported that they failed after only six years of use.

DePuy Orthopaedics, a division of Johnson & Johnson, issued a DePuy ASR hip recall last year, indicating that about 12% to 13% of these hips mail fail within five years. More than 90,000 DePuy ASR XL Acetabular Systems and DePuy ASR Hip Resurfacing Systems were sold worldwide before the metal-on-metal hip implants were recalled in August 2010. About 40,000 of those were sold in the United States.

Johnson & Johnson currently faces more than 1,000 DePuy metal-on-metal hip lawsuits that have been filed by patients whose devices failed or who have suffered metallosis. According to experts, Johnson & Johnson may have to pay out more than $1 billion in liability over the defective hip devices. Earlier this summer, it was reported that Johnson & Johnson has increased its liability fund by $570 million to cover the cost of DePuy ASR settlements.

All hip implants that use metal-on-metal designs appear to have a higher failure rate than other types of artificial hips. A hip implant is supposed to last an average of about 15 years. But, many all-metal hip replacement systems are failing much faster, causing crippling injuries, metal blood poisoning and often requiring revision surgery to have the devices replaced.

Metal-on-metal hip replacements, which use cobalt and chromium, accounted for about one-third of the 250,000 hip replacements performed in the United States in recent years. But, concerns over metal-on-metal hip replacement and metallosis have caused many orthopedic doctors to move away from the devices in recent months. According to the registry, all types of hip implants, including combinations of ceramic, plastic and metal, have only a 4.7 percent failure rate after seven years. Metal-on-metal hip implants have a failure rate of 14 percent.

As the metal hip replacement ball and socket grind against each other, cobalt and chromium metallic particles may be shed into the body, which can result in metallosis. This may result in soft tissue damage, inflammatory reactions, bone loss, and local necrosis that may lead to the need for a risky hip revision surgery.

The FDA has requested metal hip manufacturers to provide more data on metallosis and metal on metal hip implants.

As a Texas medical doctor and DePuy Hip Recall and Replacement Attorney, I am fielding many calls from concerned plaintiffs regarding their implanted DePuy ASR and DePuy Pinnacle Metal on Metal Hip prosthesis.

The Food and Drug Administration has received many complaints recently about failed hip replacements. The FDA has received more than 5,000 reports since January concerning metal-on-metal hips. The majority of complaints involve patients who have had an all-metal hip removed, or will soon undergo such a procedure because a device failed after only a few years. Metal-on-metal hip replacement systems are a widely used type of artificial hip, which are designed to last about 15 years. However, complaints suggest that thousands of people are experiencing early failure of the hip implants within a few years of surgery, often leading to additional surgery to replace the hip.

The complaints confirm that all-metal replacement hips are becoming the biggest and most costly medical implant problem since Medtronic recalled a widely used heart device component in 2007.

Some patients have suffered crippling injuries caused by tiny particles of cobalt and chromium that the metal devices shed as they wear. This is known as metallosis. This may result in soft tissue damage, inflammatory reactions, bone loss, genetic damage, asceptic fibrosis, local necrosis or other problems that may lead to the need for a risky hip revision surgery.

Hip replacement is one of the most common procedures in the United States and all-metal implants accounted for nearly one-third of the estimated 250,000 replacements performed each year. According to one estimate, some 500,000 patients have received an all-metal replacement hip.

One of the artificial hip devices, the A.S.R., or Articular Surface Replacement, was recalled last year by Johnson & Johnson and accounted for 75 percent of the complaints. Under F.D.A. rules, many all-metal devices were sold without testing in patients or without a requirement that producers track their performance. The F.D.A. in May ordered producers to study how frequently the devices were failing and to examine the threat to patients.

In August 2010, a DePuy ASR hip recall was issued for more than 90,000 of the metal hip implants, after it was discovered that a higher-than-expected number were failing within a few years of surgery. Similar problems have been reported in connection with other metal-on-metal hip implants sold by other companies.

In February 2011, the FDA launched a new website in February 2011, which was designed to provide information about the risks associated with metal-on-metal hip replacements.

The FDA has now asked device manufacturers to obtain more information about the level at which the metal particles shed by hip replacements becomes dangerous, how much metal they actually shed and what the potential side effects of metallosis are.

As problems and questions grow, some surgeons are abandoning the all-metal hips, saying they are unwilling to expose new patients to potential dangers when safer alternatives — mainly replacements that combine metal and plastic components — are available.

For many patients, it is too late. The number of complaints filed with the F.D.A. about a product understates a problem because while companies must file reports, doctors and patients do not have to. The filing volume for the DePuy A.S.R. and the Zimmer Durom cup probably reflects a surge of lawsuits filed against their makers.

According the recent New York Times review, there were 7,500 complaints about the A.S.R., nearly 5,000 of them coming since January. In the case of the Durom cup, about 1,600 complaints were filed with the regulator from 2007 to this June.

It is impossible to say how many adverse reports about all-metal hips have been submitted. The Times analysis found some 200 complaints about an all-metal version of another DePuy device called the Pinnacle as well as 400 additional complaints that noted metal-related problems in Pinnacle patients. But the Pinnacle is sold in several versions, so it was not clear how many of the metal-related complaints were linked to the all-metal device.

Many individuals throughout the United States have already filed metal-on-metal hip replacement lawsuits over problems allegedly caused by metallosis or metal poisoning. All DePuy ASR hip lawsuits have been consolidated in federal court as part of an MDL, or multidistrict litigation, in Northern District of Ohio. Lawsuits over DePuy Pinnacle hip metal-on-metal implant replacements, which is another has been consolidated in the Northern District of Texas in Dallas.

Continue reading "Risks of DePuy Metallosis Following a Metal On Metal Hip" »

As a DePuy Pinnacle Hip Replacement attorney and Texas Medical doctor I am providing this important update, regarding the first MDL hearing held in my home town of Dallas, Texas.

Attorneys from throughout the United States who represent DePuy Pinnacle hip replacement plaintiffs, met today in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas. This hearing was held in Dallas, and was the first status conference with the judge presiding over the recently formed multi-district litigation (MDL). The meeting between the plaintiff and defense attorneys was quite cordial and the hearing with Judge Kinkeade, lasted over 2 hours. This was an informal, esssentially a meet and greet type of hearing, much different from other types of contentious hearings.

It was interesting to stand at the back of the courtroom and observe the proceedings, the court room was jam packed, standing room only.

The meeting of the attorneys representing DePuy and various plaintiffs with Judge Kinkeade, addressed the format and structure of the pretrial proceedings and the composition of a committee of plaintiffs’ attorneys, who will serve in leadership positions and perform coordinated actions of the lawsuits consolidated in the MDL.

In May 2011, the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) ordered that all DePuy Pinnacle lawsuits filed in federal district courts throughout the United States will be consolidated for pretrial proceedings before U.S. District Judge Kinkeade.

According to a Master Case List released by the court on July 20, there are already 213 cases consolidated in the MDL. As DePuy Pinnacle hip replacement lawyers continue to investigate and file new cases, the federal MDL will continue to grow.

All of the suits have similar allegations that the DePuy Pinnacle Acetabular Cup System was defectively designed or manufactured, and that inadequate warnings were provided about the risk of early complications or problems, which have been developing within a few years of the surgery. In some cases, the DePuy Pinnacle hip problems may result in the need for additional surgery to replace or revise the hip replacement.

Many of the petitions also allege that DePuy, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, has been aware of the problems with their metal-on-metal hip implants for some time and that a DePuy Pinnacle hip recall should have been issued several years ago.

DePuy filed a brief last week regarding the selection of the plaintiffs’ leadership positions. DePuy claimed that several DePuy Pinnacle lawyers representing plaintiffs in the federal MDL proceedings are continuing to file cases in state courts, naming local defendants such as physicians and sales representatives to avoid removal to federal court. DePuy argued that those attorneys should not be appointed to leadership positions, because such conduct impedes the progress of the litigation and undermines the goals of the MDL proceeding.

Johnson & Johnson and DePuy also face thousands of lawsuits over the recalled DePuy ASR hip replacement system, because of a higher-than-expected failure rate. The DePuy ASR hip was approved as a substantial equivalent design to the DePuy Pinnacle metal-on-metal hip, and faces the similar allegations regarding design problems with the two devices.

In October, the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS) issued a warning about potential problems with metal on-metal hip replacements, indicating that patients and the medical community should be aware that pain months after hip replacement surgery may be a sign of metal-on-metal hip cobalt toxicity. In addition, the FDA launched a new website in February to provide information about the risks associated with metal-on-metal hip replacements.

As a Texas medical doctor and Fracking water contamination attorney, I want to pose this rhetorical question; What happens when the foxes are guarding the hen house? Consider that as you savor your morning coffee, which may be contaminated with benzene, from a contaminated water aquifer.

Oil and gas industry as well as government regulators have maintained for many decades that a drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, that is used for natural gas wells has never contaminated underground drinking water. The fracking process, involves water and toxic chemicals being injected at high pressure into the ground to break up rocks and release the gas trapped there. This process according to industry officials, occurs thousands of feet below drinking-water aquifers and because of that distance, the drilling chemicals allegedly pose no risk.

According to ExxonMobil at a Congressional hearing on drilling...“There have been over a million wells hydraulically fractured ...and there is not one, not one, reported case of a freshwater aquifer having ever been contaminated from hydraulic fracturing...”

But there is in fact a documented case, and the E.P.A. report suggests there may be more. Researchers, were unable to investigate many suspected cases because their details were sealed from the public when energy companies settled lawsuits with landowners. E.P.A. says this practice continues to prevent them from fully assessing the risks of certain types of gas drilling.

The American Petroleum Institute, dismissed the assertion that sealed settlements have hidden problems with gas drilling, and according to their data, they have found that drinking water contamination from fracking is highly improbable.

The documented E.P.A. case, and the report was published in 1987, and the contamination was discovered in 1984. The report concluded that hydraulic fracturing fluids or gel used by the Kaiser Exploration and Mining Company contaminated a well roughly 600 feet away on the property of James Parsons in Jackson County, W.Va., referring to it as “Mr. Parson’s water well.”

“When fracturing the Kaiser gas well on Mr. James Parson’s property, fractures were created allowing migration of fracture fluid from the gas well to Mr. Parson’s water well,” according to the agency’s summary of the case. “This fracture fluid, along with natural gas was present in Mr. Parson’s water, rendering it unusable.”

In their report, E.P.A. officials also wrote that Mr. Parsons’ case was highlighted as an “illustrative” example of the hazards created by this type of drilling, and that legal settlements and nondisclosure agreements prevented access to scientific documentation of other incidents. “This is typical practice, for instance, in Texas,” the report stated. “In some cases, the records of well-publicized damage incidents are almost entirely unavailable for review.”

Industry officials emphasize that all forms of drilling involve some degree of risk. The question, they say, is what represents an acceptable level. Once chemicals contaminate underground drinking-water sources, they are very difficult to remove, according to federal and industry studies.

A 2004 study by the E.P.A. agency concluded that hydraulic fracturing of one kind of natural gas well — coal-bed methane wells — posed “little or no threat” to underground drinking water supplies. The study was later criticized by some within the agency as being unscientific and unduly influenced by industry.

Instances of gas bubbling from fracked sites into nearby water wells have been extensively documented. The industry has also acknowledged that fracking liquids can end up in aquifers because of failures in the casing of wells, spills that occur above ground or through other factors.

Both types of contamination can render the water unusable. However, contamination from fracking fluids is widely considered more worrisome because the fluids can contain carcinogens like benzene.

The risk of abandoned wells serving as conduits for contamination is one that the E.P.A. is currently researching as part of its national study on fracking. Many states lack complete records with the number or location of these abandoned wells and they lack the resources to ensure that abandoned and active wells are inspected regularly.

A 1999 report by the Department of Energy said there were about 2.5 million abandoned oil and natural gas wells in the United States at the time.

Short answer, carbon based energy is not the answer, in this current heat wave that most of the country is withering under, think of the amount of solar energy that can be harvested?

Studies have shown that a solar array set up, in Nevada can supply all of the energy needs of the USA, for the next century.

Continue reading "Fracking Water Contamination" »

As a Texas medical doctor and Transvaginal Mesh Attorney I am providing this information and commentary.

11.6% of women who undergo surgery with transvaginal placement of Ethicon Gynecare Prolift Mesh for repair of pelvic organ prolapse (POP) have to undergo additional operations due to post operative complications.

This complication rate was found as a result of a new study, published by the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology. Most of the re-operations were due to urinary incontinence that occurred after the mesh was implanted, with other problems including transvaginal mesh complications and prolapse recurrence.

Researchers reviewed the outcomes for 524 patients who received the Ethicon Gynecare Prolift vaginal mesh over a 4 year period. At a follow up of 38 months, 11.6% had to undergo reoperation after receiving the Prolift Mesh for pelvic organ prolapse. Over 50% of those reoperations were due to urinary incontinence, More than 25% due to mesh-related complications and more than 25% due to recurring prolapse. The researchers found that the number of mesh-related complications and POP decreased when experienced medical teams implanted the mesh.

The Gyncare Prolift Total, Anterior and Posterior Pelvic Floor Repair Systems was first introduced in September 2005, and Gynecare Prolift+M variations were introduced in May 2008. The vaginal mesh or bladder sling is designed reinforce weakened or damaged tissue on the pelvic floor that hold organs in place, such as the bladder, the uterus and the rectum.

Recently, the FDA issued a warning about the risk of problems with Ethicon Gynecare vaginal mesh and other similar products used for pelvic organ prolapse. The agency declared that transvaginal surgical mesh for pelvic organ prolapse does not provide any benefit over other means of treatment, and has been associated with hundreds of reports of serious problems.

Between 2008 and 2010, the FDA received more than 1,500 reports of transvaginal mesh problems after pelvic organ prolapse repair surgery, including erosion of the mesh into the vagina, contraction or shrinkage of the mesh, infection, pelvic pain, urinary problems, vaginal scarring among other complications.

A number of Gynecare Prolift mesh lawsuits have been filed against Ethicon, Inc., which is a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson. At least 400 complaints have been filed in New Jersey state court over the Prolift mesh and other similar vaginal bladder sling products made by Ethicon, such as Gynemesh, Prolene Mesh and TVT slings.

In addition to Ethicon vaginal mesh products, problems have also been associated with slings sold by American Medical Systems (AMS), Boston Scientific, C.R. Bard and other companies. Transvaginal mesh lawyers are also reviewing potential claims against manufacturers of these products for women who experienced problems with surgical mesh for pelvic organ prolapse repair.

Continue reading "Ethicon Gynecare Prolift Mesh Linked to 11.6% Reoperation Rate" »

As a Texas medical doctor and Dallas Hydraulic Fracking Attorney I am providing this information and commentary.

The EPA is prohibited from regulating hydraulic fracturing under the Safe Drinking Water Act. On July 28, 2011, the EPA proposed federal regulations to reduce smog-forming pollutants released by the hydraulic fracturing approach to gas drilling.

According to the EPA, If approved, the rules would amount to the first national standards for fracking of any kind. The agency sets guidelines when companies inject fluids underground, but in 2005 Congress prohibited the EPA from doing so for fracking. Regulation has been left to the states, some of which compel companies to report what chemicals they use and have imposed tougher well-design standards.

The new EPA proposal would limit emissions released during the stages of natural gas production and development, and targets the volatile organic compounds released in large quantities when wells are fracked. According to the EPA, drillers would have to use equipment that captures these gases. According to environmental experts, the proposed rules represent a step by federal regulators amid a growing controversy over fracking's safety.

The American Petroleum Institute, the country's main oil and gas lobbying group, has requested that the EPA delay finalizing the rules for at least six months beyond the current Feb. 2012 deadline.

The Marcellus Shale Coalition, a group representing gas drillers in the Northeast, issued a statement criticizing the proposed regulations, saying they would "undercut" gas production.

The EPA proposal is the result of a successful 2009 lawsuit brought against the agency by WildEarth Guardians and another advocacy group alleging that the agency had not updated air-quality rules as required. The EPA is supposed to review such rules at least every eight years, but in some cases had not done so for 10 years or more.

According to Jeremy Nichols, the climate and energy program director for WildEarth Guardians, hydraulic fracturing is a major source of emissions because when fluids used to frack a well return to the surface, they carry gases that can be vented into the air. In fracking's case the soupy return contains methane, volatile organic compounds and toxic chemicals such as benzene, which generally spray into the environment. In some gas drilling areas, where emissions from drilling are particularly high, they no longer meet federal air quality standards.

The EPA proposal also calls for reducing emissions of toxic chemicals, such as cancer-causing benzene, produced by processing, transmitting and storing natural gas. Some environmentalist experts were disappointed that the proposed rules do not target methane, a potent greenhouse gas that is also the primary ingredient of natural gas. The oil and gas sector accounts for nearly 40 percent of all methane emissions nationwide, according to the EPA.

Click here. Drilling Regulatory Staffing in Your State. Search for how many wells have been drilled and how many gas regulators are in your state.

Click here. Graphics: What is Hydraulic Fracturing? Anatomy of a Gas Well

Continue reading "EPA Hydraulic Fracturing and Water Contamination" »

As a Texas medical doctor and Dallas DePuy Pinnacle hip replacement Attorney I am providing this information and commentary.

DePuy Orthopaedics ASR hip replacement devices have resulted in a tsunami of lawsuits against DePuy's parent company, Johnson & Johnson. Could the DePuy Pinnacle hip replacement result in a similar wave of litigation against the device maker?

According to sources, Johnson & Johnson faces approximately 1,000 lawsuits related to its metal-on-metal hip replacement devices. Both the ASR and the Pinnacle are metal-on-metal devices. The ASR devices were recalled following reports of high failure rates in the devices. The Pinnacle has not been recalled.

DePuy claims that a report from Britain that showed a high failure rate was the first sign that there was a problem with the metal-on-metal hip device. When DePuy knew about the high failure rate of its ASR devices will be a key issue in litigation concerning the ASR. Some lawsuits allege DePuy knew in 2007, approximately two years before the device was recalled, about the high failure rate associated with the ASR.

In addition to failure of the hip device—which can result in revision surgery to replace the faulty hip device—some patients say they have developed toxic levels of cobalt and chromium in their bloodstream, a side effect of metal debris coming loose from the hip replacement device. This medical condition is called metallosis.

Some lawsuits have been filed against DePuy concerning the Pinnacle, although those lawsuits reportedly number in the dozens, not in the thousands. According to reports, similar defects have been reported in the Pinnacle as in the ASR devices. DePuy defends the Pinnacle as a safe and effective device.

According to experts, Johnson & Johnson could face up to $1 billion in liability and costs linked to the DePuy ASR lawsuits. Many lawsuits filed against Johnson & Johnson have been consolidated in federal court. Whether or not Johnson & Johnson and DePuy Orthopaedics will face a wave of litigation related to the Pinnacle remains to be seen.

Continue reading "DePuy ASR and Pinnacle Metal on Metal Hips" »

As a Dallas Denture Cream Side Effect Attorney, I am providing this Poligrip Zinc side effect litigation update.

GlaxoSmithKline may have paid out more than $120 million in Poligrip denture cream settlements to resolve claims brought by consumers who suffered permanent nerve damage due to zinc in the adhesive products. According to sources, the manufacturer has settled more than 100 denture cream lawsuits at an average cost of just over $1 million per case.

Glaxo agreed to remove zinc from its line of denture-cream products after researchers linked some neurological problems, including nerve damage, to use of zinc-laden denture adhesives. The company’s Super Poligrip Original, Ultra Fresh and Extra Care products all contained zinc, which improves adhesive power. Glaxo and Procter & Gamble Co. (PG), the Cincinnati-based maker of the competing Fixodent denture cream, had lawsuits filed against them consolidated before a federal judge in Florida in 2005.

Product liability lawyers allege that the drugmakers knew for years that their products contained harmful levels of zinc and failed to warn customers. Zinc poisoning can deplete the body of copper, which can lead to nerve damage, resulting in weakness in the arms and legs, balance problems and memory loss.

A flood of law suits followed a 2008 University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas medical study of patients suffering from neurological problems. The study linked the cause to denture-cream use. According to the complaints, high amounts of zinc in the denture adhesive can enter the body through use of Super Poligrip, leading to permanent neurological problems like neuropathy, numbness, tingling, pain, weakness, loss of sensation, loss of balance, paralysis and difficulty breathing.

The first Fixodent nerve damage trial is scheduled to begin on June 20. In that case, lawyers for Florida resident Marianne Chapman allege Procter & Gamble defectively designed Fixodent by including zinc in its formulation. The consolidated case is In Re Denture Cream Products Liability Litigation, 09-02051, U.S. District Court, Southern District of Florida (Miami.)

There have been no reports of Fixodent denture cream settlements. Proctor and Gamble argues that its products contained less zinc than those of Glaxo and that it does not believe Fixodent can cause neurological damage.

All federal lawsuits over zinc poisoning from denture cream have been centralized in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida for pretrial litigation. Individual complaints filed by dozens of people throughout the United States have been consolidated to avoid duplicative discovery, inconsistent pretrial rulings from different judges and to serve the convenience of the court, the parties and the witnesses.

Continue reading "Denture Cream Zinc Poisoning Lawsuit Update" »

As a Multaq Dangerous Drug attorney and Texas medical doctor, I am providing this information on a drug company sponsored trial of its drug Multaq, which was halted because of increased cardiovascular side effects and injuries.

Sanofi, maker of dronedarone (Multaq), has stopped its phase 3b trial of its antiarrhythmic drug due to an increase in cardiovascular events seen in patients with permanent atrial fibrillation - an unapproved indication for the antiarrhythmic drug. The PALLAS trial was testing the drug in patients with permanent atrial fibrillation (AF) and at least one other cardiovascular disease risk factor; at present, dronedarone is approved in patients with nonpermanent AF.

According to the primary medical investigator, ". . . there was a significant increase in major cardiovascular events, and in our study that was defined as a composite of stroke, MI, systemic embolism, or cardiovascular death. . . . These were pretty important events."

Multaq, is approved for patients with the non-permanent kind of atrial fibrillation. The trial, known as the PALLAS study, was testing Multaq’s usefulness in patients with permanent atrial fibrillation (more than 6 months of the abnormal rhythms).

Dronedarone has faced a range of criticisms since its approval in the US in July 2009, including questions about its safety/efficacy tradeoff and the design and execution of the ATHENA study. Just last week, newspapers in France reported that French health authorities had concluded that the efficacy of dronedarone was "insufficient"—an opinion that could lead to the drug being dropped from the country's drug reimbursement formulary.

Dronedarone, sold by sanofi-aventis, is currently approved to treat atrial flutter and paroxysmal or persistent - but not permanent atrial fibrillation.

The phase 3b trial, called PALLAS, had enrolled 3,148 patients with permanent atrial fibrillation, with 70% showing symptoms for more than two years, according to a company statement. Sanofi did not specify the cardiovascular events seen in the dronedarone-treated patients, or the magnitude of the increase.

In January, sanofi-aventis and the FDA warned that reports of acute liver injury associated with the drug had been received. The statement noted that patients with permanent atrial fibrillation and "vascular risk factors" are at high risk for cardiovascular events.

An earlier trial of dronedarone in patients with relatively severe heart failure, called ANDROMEDA, was halted early when mortality in patients receiving the drug was found to be twice that seen in the control group.

Sanofi-aventis has alerted healthcare professionals to several reports of liver function test abnormalities and hepatocellular injury in patients treated with its atrial fibrillation drug dronedarone (Multaq). The Dear Healthcare Provider letter included two post-marketing case reports of acute liver failure that required transplantation, occurring at four-and-a-half and six months after the start of dronedarone therapy. The patients - both female and about 70 years old - had had normal hepatic serum enzymes before starting the drug.

In the letter, sanofi-aventis instructed healthcare professionals to tell patients to immediately report any symptoms suggestive of hepatic injury. According to the FDA, these include anorexia, nausea, vomiting, fever, malaise, fatigue, right upper quadrant pain, jaundice, dark urine, or itching.

Periodic liver enzyme tests, especially in the first six months of treatment, should also be considered, according to the FDA, although it is unknown whether such a strategy will prevent the development of liver injury.

Dronedarone's prescribing information will be updated to include the guidance from the Dear Physician letter, and will be distributed after the FDA approves it. The agency confirmed that a warning about potential liver injury will be added to the drug's label.

According to the FDA, from the drug's approval in July 2009 through October 2010, about 492,000 prescriptions for dronedarone were dispensed and about 117,000 patients filled prescriptions at U.S. pharmacies.

The drug was approved with a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy to prevent use in patients with severe heart failure or in those with less severe heart failure who were recently hospitalized for the condition. Such patients had a doubling in the risk of death in a placebo-controlled study.

Continue reading "Multaq Study Stopped: Linked to Other Heart Problems" »

As a Texas Chantix side effect and Product Liability Attorney and Texas medical attorney, I am providing this update.
New medical research suggests that Chantix side effects increases the risk of heart attacks, strokes and other cardiovascular events.

Pfizer’s smoking cessation drug Chantix raises the risk of suffering a cardiac event by 72%, according to a study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Researchers found that those who took Chantix were substantially more likely to suffer heart problems than those who took a placebo, and two of the co-authors suggested that the findings were strong enough that the FDA should consider a Chantix recall due to the risk of heart attack and stroke.

The study comes just three weeks after the FDA issued a drug safety communication about the risk of heart problems from Chantix, warning that the smoking cessation drug might increase the risk of certain cardiovascular events, including the risk of heart attack, among individuals who had cardiovascular disease. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is notifying the public that the smoking cessation aid Chantix (varenicline) may be associated with a small, increased risk of certain cardiovascular adverse events in patients who have cardiovascular disease. This safety information will be added to the Warnings and Precautions section of the Chantix physician labeling. The patient Medication Guide will also be revised to inform patients about this possible risk.

The warning risk of a heart attack or stroke from Chantix is just the latest of serious side effects associated with the drug. Warnings about the risk of life-threatening psychological side effects of Chantix, which increases the risk of suicide, was added to a black box on the medications label two years ago.

Chantix (varenicline) was approved in the United States by the FDA in 2006 as a prescription medication to help people quit smoking. The prescription medication designed to help people stop smoking already holds the title of being the drug associated with the most FDA adverse event reports of any prescription medication in the United States.

A number of Chantix lawsuits have been filed in courts throughout the United States on behalf of individuals who have died or suffered serious injuries as a result of a suicide or unusual behavior allegedly caused by Chantix.

Continue reading "Chantix Increases Heart Attacks" »

As a DePuy ASR and Pinnacle Metal on Metal Hips attorney, I am providing this update. It is in our nature to want the latest and greatest — whether it is a faster car, a smarter computer or a smaller cell phone, and this applies equally to medicine, where we want the newest and presumably safer drugs and medical devices.

But medical innovation can become a trap for the unwary; we are now seeing this playing out with deadly consequences for thousands of patients who are using the 4th generation birth control pills Yaz and Yasmin over the safer 3rd generation older contraceptive pills and those folks who now are the recipients of metal on metal artificial hips.

The metal-on-metal hips, were regarded by hip manufacturers and surgeons as a technological break through over previous designs that used both metal and plastic. Now the FDA (who had been asleep at the wheel) and medical researchers are panicking to determine how many implant recipients have been injured by the devices.

The Food and Drug Administration recently ordered manufacturers of all metal hips to undertake emergency studies of patients. The rush to implant the latest and greatest, and patients' demand shows how innovation’s siren call led a product promoted as a breakthrough without convincing evidence that it was better or even as good as existing options.

In 2010, DePuy, the orthopedics division of Johnson & Johnson, recalled one of its all-metal hips, the ASR, which was failing at a high rate. Furthermore, another DePuy product, the Pinnacle (which has not yet been recalled) is now under scrutiny for excessive failures. Another manufacturer, Zimmer Holdings, also briefly halted sales of one of its metal models, the Durom. DePuy, Zimmer and other companies continue to deny that there are any problems with their products.

THE modern artificial hip, which was developed in the 1960s, uses a simple design. A metal “ball” made of cobalt and chromium replaces the top of the thigh bone, while a “cup,” typically made of plastic, serves as an artificial hip socket. By the 1990s, the devices were considered highly effective, with studies then finding that implants still worked a decade after surgery in 95 percent of patients.

By 2008, metal on metal hips were used in one out of every three hip replacements, of approximately 250,000 hips implanted annually in the United States. By using a metal cup, which is thinner than a plastic one, a surgeon could implant a bigger ball component, which was assumed to be less likely to dislocate than a smaller one. But recent research, demonstrates that such oversized components may be the reason the devices shed metallic debris.

As the number of affected patients nationwide increased, it became apparent that the devices had not been properly tested. Under F.D.A. regulatory rules, most all-metal hips do not have to undergo clinical trials before sale. They are tested in labs on machines that simulate millions of steps to study the forces exerted by years of motion. According to testing experts, all-metal devices proved worse than metal-and-plastic ones to small variations in how they were implanted, with components sometimes striking together and generating debris.

The devices, as a group, are twice as likely as metal-and-plastic ones to require early replacement, according to data from Australia’s orthopedic registry, one of the most comprehensive databases on implants. Most importantly, damage from debris generated by metal implants in some patients, has caused crippling tissue and muscle damage, and has produced neurological problems, a condition known as metallosis.

It is estimated, about 500,000 patients in the United States may have gotten an all-metal hip, and thousands will have painful early-replacement procedures. The lawsuits against DePuy and other makers of all-metal hips may emerge as the largest product liability cases of this decade.

Continue reading "DePuy ASR and Pinnacle Metal on Metal Hips" »

As a Dangerous and Defective Drug attorney, I am writing this opinion piece, regarding the latest US Supreme Court Generic Drug Decision, which in my humble opinion is disastrous to Patient Safety. The case is PLIVA, Inc. v. Mensing.

On June 23, 2011, the United States Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that Generic Drug Manufacturers cannot be sued for failing to warn consumers of the possible side effects of their defective products, as long as they use the same warnings on the brand-name drugs. This decision is absurd on its face; this means that brand-name drug manufacturers can be held responsible for their failure to warn consumers about the dangers, but generic manufacturers are now provided an all encompassing shield that brand-name manufacturers do not have.

The seriousness and ramifications of this opinion cannot be understated. The Court’s decision now prevents millions of Americans, who have been seriously injured by generic drugs, from seeking compensation for their injuries. Generic drug manufacturers have a huge business in the United States. This opinion immunizes those drug manufacturers from liability. Another win for Big Pharma, and the consumer gets it again.

The dissent, ridiculed the Court’s decision, stating, “As a result of today’s decision, whether a consumer harmed by inadequate warnings can obtain relief turns solely on the happenstance of whether her pharmacist filled her prescription with a brand-name or generic drug. The Court gets one thing right: this outcome makes little sense.” “In some States, pharmacists must dispense generic drugs absent instruction to the contrary from a consumer’s physician. Even when consumers can request brand-name drugs, the price of the brand-name drug or the consumers’ insurance plans may make it impossible to do so. As a result, in many cases, consumers will have no ability to preserve their state-law right to recover for injuries caused by inadequate warnings.”

In many cases, once generic versions of a drug enter the market, the brand name manufacturers stop selling the drug. A consumer may have no option but to use a generic drug, and then find themselves without a remedy if they develop a catastrophic injury.

This decision also means that brand-name manufacturers will be held to a different yet safer standard. The Supreme Court decided in Wyeth v. Levine, brand-name manufacturers are responsible for their warning labels and required to update them at all times.

Patients will now be taking generic drugs at their own risk. It is absurd that doctors and patients will have to make medical decisions knowing that only brand-name drug manufacturers – not generics – can be held accountable for their drugs' dangerous side-effects.

Today, 70 percent of all prescription drugs are filled with generic versions, accounting for about 2.6 billion prescriptions every year. Additionally, the generic drug industry continues to expand – nine of the industry's 10 biggest blockbuster drugs are going off-patent within in the next few years.

The ruling is an immense blow for consumer rights, equality and fairness, principals upon which the American legal system was founded.

As a Crestor Side Effect attorney and cardiologist, I am writing this blog article to highlight the side effects of cardiac for patients who are taking statins, particularly Crestor to manage their high cholesterol levels.

According to new medical studies, the use of statins, especially Crestor, can be a major cause of cardiomyopathy, a heart problem caused by heart muscle weakening. Statins are prescribed to lower cholesterol levels. The drugs do this by by inhibiting the key enzyme HMG-CoA reductase, which is involved in the cholesterol synthesis pathway. But a side effect of statins leads to reduced levels of Coenzyme Q10, an important chemical required for proper muscle functioning.

A 2009 Lancet article focused on that issue and indicated that statins, like Crestor, as one cause of heart failure. (See Florkowski, S Molyneux, P George, M Lever, N-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and statins in heart failure, Lancet 2009.)

Cardiovascular side effects from Crestor use are serious and may be life-threatening. If you or a loved one experienced cardiovascular injury or death, congestive heart failure, or immune-mediated necrotizing myopathy while taking Crestor, you may have a claim.

Crestor (generically known as Rosuvastatin), is an oral prescription drug designed to reduce the cholesterol blood levels when used together with lifestyle changes of diet and exercise. AstraZeneca, the manufacturer, designed the drug to reduce the production of cholesterol in the liver and by increasing the liver’s ability to remove “bad” LDL cholesterol. Crestor has been marketed as a "super-statin" because it claims to lower LDL cholesterol more than other statin drugs.

There are currently five statin drugs on the market in addition to Crestor: Lescol (fluvastatin), Lipitor (atorvastatin), Mevacor (lovastatin), Pravachol (pravastatin) and Zocor (simvastatin). Baycol (cerivastatin), another statin drug, was removed from the market in 2001 because of serious side effects reported by patients.

Crestor History
The FDA withheld approval for Crestor following concerns to the recall of Baycol and the kidney and muscle side effects reported in Crestor drug trials that were similar to those associated with Baycol. The FDA approved Crestor in August 2003 for the 5, 10, 20, and 40 mg doses following a clinical trial involving approximately 12,000 patients. The 80 mg dosage was not approved.

In March 2004, the non-profit organization Public Citizen asked the FDA to remove Crestor from the market, stating that Crestor side effects were severe and that the drug should never have been placed on the market. Read the FDA response to the Public Citizen petition on Crestor. The FDA issued a Public Health Advisory for Crestor on June 9, 2004, warning of the “increased risk for serious muscle toxicity (myopathy) associated with Crestor use, especially at the highest approved dose of 40 mg.”

In March 2005, the FDA issued an alert warning that “Rhabdomyolysis (serious muscle damage) has been reported in patients taking Crestor as well as other statin drugs. The labeling for Crestor has been revised to include information on the safe use of Crestor to reduce the risk for serious muscle toxicity, especially at the highest approved dose of 40 mg.”

Zocor Side Effects and Warnings
FDA in June 2011 warned about the risk of muscle injury in patients taking the highest dose of anti-cholesterol Zocor. Now patients and plaintiffs considering a Crestor lawsuit may be considering if the FDA’s Zocor warning applies to Crestor side effects. The FDA has recommended to patients and doctors that, “Zocor, Simvastatin 80 mg should not be started in new patients, including patients already taking lower doses of the drug.”
Click here for Public Citizen opinion of Zocor.

SEARCH Study Results Leads to FDA Zocor Warning
The recent FDA study was based on data from the trial SEARCH (Study of the Effectiveness of Additional Reductions in Cholesterol and Homocysteine) which assessed the frequency of serious cardiovascular injuries, including heart attack and death, in patients who took the maximum Zocor dosage of 80 mg as compared to those who took only 20 mg of the drug.

Crestor Side Effects Similar to Zocor Warning
Zocor muscle injuries are similar to the Crestor side effects. The higher the dosage of a “super-statin,” the greater the risk a patient runs of developing Crestor side effects such as muscle pain and weakness, and the potentially fatal rhabdomyolysis, in which muscle fiber breakdown products is released into the bloodstream and causes kidney damage or failure.

Continue reading "Crestor Side Effects & Cardiomyopathy" »

Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm is currently evaluating and accepting Fosamax long bone fracture cases and defective drug product liability claims. We are providing this Fosamax lawsuit update for the benefit of our readers and current Fosamax injury clients.

All federal Fosamax Femur low-impact bone fractures lawsuits have been consolidated for pretrial proceedings as part of a new MDL, or multidistrict litigation, which will be centralized in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.

At least 37 Fosamax fracture lawsuits are currently pending in federal district courts throughout the United States, and those cases will be transferred to New Jersey for further litigation. In addition, as new complaints over femur fractures on Fosamax are filed in the federal court system, they will also be added to this new MDL.

Fosamax lawsuits over jaw problems, known as osteonecrosis of the jaw, which will remain centralized as part of a different MDL in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

All of the complaints involve similar allegations that side effects of Fosamax, can increase the risk of atypical thigh bone fractures, which often occur with little or no trauma at all. Plaintiffs claim that Merck failed to adequately warn about the risk of femur fractures from Fosamax, or that users should seek immediate medical attention if they experience groin pain, which may occur several weeks before a complete fracture while on Fosamax.

In October 2010, the FDA required new warnings about the risk of bone fractures from Fosamax and other similar bisphosphonate medications. There are currently more than 900 Fosamax jaw lawsuits consolidated in New York, as part of an MDL that was established in August 2006. Fosamax fracture lawsuits were previously excluded from that MDL, because it was determined that the evidence of general causation leading to femur fractures would likely differ substantially from cases dealing with jaw bone damage.

Continue reading "Fosamax Bisphosphonate Femoral Fracture Litigation" »

As a DePuy Pinnacle Hip Failure and Replacement Attorney, I am providing this new information for my product liability clients.

On August 2010, there was a recall of the DePuy ASR XL artificial hip, and now DePuy may be facing the recall of the Pinnacle Acetabular Component. All federal lawsuits over DePuy Pinnacle hip replacement problems have been consolidated for pretrial proceedings as part of an MDL, or multidistrict litigation, which will be centralized in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Dallas.

The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation issued an order establishing the MDL, which will result in the transfer of 60 DePuy Pinnacle hip lawsuits currently pending in federal district courts throughout the United States.

Like the DePuy ASR XL, the Depuy Pinnacle is a metal on metal system that was designed to last at least 10-15 years but now, orthopedic surgeons are reporting that these devices have been failing within one to two years of being implanted into their patients.

DePuy, a division of Johnson & Johnson, has implanted over 150,000 Pinnacle hip replacements since 2001. Its recent recall of the defective ASR metal-on-metal hip implant systems has thousands of hip implant patients to have additional hip revision surgeries.

The ASR and Pinnacle are both metal on metal systems, and the ASR is a monoblock design, the Pinnacle uses a modular system. The ASR cup is made of one solid piece of metal, the Pinnacle has an outer shell and the Pinnacle is designed allow the surgeon the option to place a metal, ceramic or polyethylene liner inside the metal outer cup.

The Pinnacle 36 mm Ultamet Metal-on-Metal component is failing at an unacceptably high rate. Research suggests that there is a design problem, and the device has been created with one of the lowest clearance levels in the industry. Experts investigating the product design believe that DePuy created a very narrow window for proper placement of the prosthesis and inadequately trained surgeons in the proper implantation technique.

The recalled DePuy ASR system and the Pinnacle was permitted under the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) 510(k) approval process, which allows a medical device to be placed on the market without being subjected to clinical trials as long as the manufacturer can show that the device is “substantially equivalent” to a device already approved on the market. DePuy’s ASR system avoided clinical trials by showing that it was similar to the DePuy Pinnacle hip replacement system.

The FDA has received complaints and adverse incident reports against the Pinnacle system, and the Pinnacle’s propensity to prematurely separate from the bone. Constant friction in the metal on metal Pinnacle causes an increased risk of metallosis, the release of metal particles into the surrounding soft tissue or bloodstream, particularly chromium and cobalt.

The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm hip replacement team continues to investigate claims of Pinnacle failures and counsel our clients on what to do in the event that they need revision surgery.

Continue reading "DePuy Pinnacle Replacement Recall Lawsuit " »

Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm is investigating the connection between SimplyThick and cases of http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0002133/">necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) in premature infants. What is the Connection Between SimplyThick and Necrotizing Enterocolitis?

NEC has no definitive known cause. An infectious agent has been suspected, as cluster outbreaks in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) have been seen, but no common organism has been identified. Pseudomonas aeruginosa is suspected for causing necrotizing enterocolitis in premature infants and neutropaenic cancer patients, often secondary to gut colonization. A combination of intestinal flora, inherent weakness in the neonatal immune system, empirical antibiotic use for 5 days or more, alterations in mesenteric blood flow and milk feeding may be factors. The most common area of the bowel affected by NEC is near the ileocecal valve (the site of transition between the small and large bowel). NEC is almost never seen in infants before oral feedings are initiated. Formula feeding increases the risk of NEC by tenfold compared to infants who are fed breastmilk alone. Expressed breast milk protects the premature infant not only by its antiinfective effect and its immunoglobulin agents but also from its rapid digestion.

There are 15 reported cases of necrotizing enterocolitis in premature infants who were fed mother’s breast milk or infant formula thickened with SimplyThick, and 2 of the babies have died. The babies were fed SimplyThick for varying amounts of time before symptoms of NEC appeared. Major NEC symptoms include the following:

green vomit
diarrhea or bloody stools
swollen belly (abdomen)
red or blue color in the belly
breathing problems
slow heart rate.

The cases of necrotizing enterocolitis all involve premature infants who became sick over the past six months. Necrotizing enterocolitis most often occurs in babies within the hospital early in their premature course. But among the SimplyThick babies, some had been discharged from the hospital to home on a feeding regimen that included SimplyThick and then fell ill at home.

Severe cases of NEC can result in the following:

A segment of intestine may need to be removed.
Scarring and narrowing of the bowel.
The intestine may not be able to absorb nutrients normally, malabsorption.
If SimplyThick caused the NEC, and the baby dies, then the family has a wrongful death claim against the manufacturer.

Continue reading "SimplyThick Necrotizing Enterocolitis NEC " »

As a Dallas SimplyThick Necrotizing Enterocolitis attorney, I am providing this FDA update and press release.

FDA notified parents, caregivers and health care providers not to feed SimplyThick, a thickening agent for management of swallowing disorders, to infants born before 37 weeks. The product may cause necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), a life-threatening condition characterized by inflammation and death of intestinal tissue. SimplyThick is a brand of thickening agent—available to consumers and medical centers—to help manage swallowing difficulties. It is sold in packets of individual servings and in 64-ounce dispenser bottles. The product can be purchased from distributors and local pharmacies throughout the United States.

On May 20, the FDA issued a SimplyThick public health warning following 15 cases of necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) in premature infants who were fed it, including at least two deaths. The FDA said the thickening agent should not be given to any infants who were born before 37 weeks of gestation.

FDA officials said they were first made aware of the potential risk of bowel problems from SimplyThick after reports were submitted by doctors to the FDA’s Adverse Event Reporting System (AERS) on May 13. At least four different medical centers have had infants contract necrotizing enterocolitis from SimplyThick.

FDA officials indicate that they are unable to determine, why SimplyThick side effects would cause necrotizing enterocolitis in premature infants. The condition usually affects infants very early, but those that appear to be related to SimplyThick had a late onset, with some not being affected until they had been released from the hospital.

Necrotizing enterocolitis is an intestinal disorder that results in inflammation and necrosis of intestinal tissues. It is usually diagnosed in premature babies and can be life-threatening. Symptoms can include a bloated abdominal area, green-tinged vomiting and blood stools.

The FDA is currently investigating the link between SimplyThick and the bowel problems for infants. Parents, doctors and care givers are urged not to give SimplyThick to premature infants. Parents and caregivers who have questions or concerns related to the use of the product and/or who have medical concerns should contact their health care provider.

Health care professionals and patients are encouraged to report adverse events or side effects related to the use of this product to the FDA's MedWatch Safety Information and Adverse Event Reporting Program by:

Completing and submitting the adverse report online: www.fda.gov/MedWatch/report.htm
Downloading the pre-addressed, postage-paid FDA Form 3500 (calling 1-800-332-1088 request the form), and faxing it to 1-800-FDA-0178; or
Mailing the completed form to MedWatch 5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20857.

Continue reading "SimplyThick Necrotizing Entercolitis Recall" »

As a Dallas, Texas Steven Johnson Syndrome attorney, I am providing this jury verdict against J&J Motrin.

A Pennsylvania jury ruled that a Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) unit must pay $10 million in damages to the family of a 13-year-old girl who suffered skin burns and eye damage after she took Children’s Motrin.

Jurors found J&J’s McNeil Consumer Products unit liable for Brianna Maya’s injuries. Maya, was left blind in one eye and suffered burns over 84 percent of her body after taking Motrin in 2000 when she was 3 1/2.

J&J, and McNeil have faced at least two other jury trials over claims the companies hid the pain relievers’ links to Stevens-Johnson Syndrome, an allergic drug reaction that can leave patients with damaged eyes, blistered mouth and burned skin.

A California jury cleared J&J and McNeil of liability in 2008 for injuries suffered by an 11-year-old girl who took the pain relievers and developed the syndrome. Two years later, a federal jury in Illinois awarded a woman who took Children’s Motrin and suffered similar injuries $3.5 million in damages. A judge threw that award out on procedural grounds.

In the Philadelphia case, Maya's attorney argued that Maya developed a rash, skin lesions, eye infections and lung damage after taking Children’s Motrin in 2000, according to court filings. He contended J&J officials didn’t include a warning on that year’s label alerting consumers the fever medicine can trigger Stevens- Johnson Syndrome.

The companies later warned that ibuprofen, the pain reliever’s active ingredient, could trigger “a severe allergic reaction,” the symptoms of which could include rashes and blisters, according to court filings. The Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas jury found that McNeil was negligent for not providing a proper warning about Children’s Motrin’s risks and that failure was “a factual cause” of the girl’s injuries. The panel rejected claims that the pain reliever was defectively designed or that McNeil officials’ conduct warranted an award of punitive damages.

The case is Maya v. Johnson & Johnson, 002879, February Term 2009, Court of Common Pleas, Philadelphia County (Philadelphia).

Continue reading "Steven Johnson's Syndrome Verdict Against J&J Motrin" »

The Food and Drug Administration has ordered all producers of “metal-on-metal” artificial hips to undertake studies, which have been linked to high early failure rates and severe health effects.

The producers of “metal-on-metal” hips will have to conduct studies of patients to determine whether the implants are shedding high levels of metallic debris.

The FDA on May 6 sent the request to J&J and 20 other device makers, including Biomet Inc., Stryker Corp. and Zimmer Holdings Inc., asking them to conduct postmarket surveillance of the hip replacements.

Metal-on-metal hips, in which the ball-and-socket components are made from metals like cobalt and chromium, accounted for about one-third of the 250,000 hip replacement procedures preformed annually in the United States.

In March, the British Orthopaedic Association, reported that one model of all-metal hip made by a unit of Johnson & Johnson was projected to fail in one-half of the patients who received it within six years after implant. The company no longer sells the ASR device.

The British medical group also estimated, based on hospital data, that the early failure rate for all-metal hips made by other manufacturers was higher than expected, ranging from 12 to 15 percent within five years after implant. Artificial hips are designed to last for 15 years or more.

According to Dr. Maisel, the F.D.A. official, it was up to each manufacturer to determine how to conduct its studies. Under the agency rule, producers have 30 days to file a proposed plan with the F.D.A. He also said companies would be expected to collect information from patients who received the devices, including taking blood samples to determine the levels of metallic ion in their systems.

The companies are also being asked to determined how frequently the devices are failing.

“This is the largest group of studies that we have asked for,” for an approved class of devices, said Dr. Maisel.

Along with the DePuy division of Johnson & Johnson, other major producers of hip implants include Zimmer, Stryker, Biomet and Wright Medical.

Continue reading "FDA Investigates Metal on Metal Hip Manufacturers" »

Over the last few months our office has been inundated with phone calls from patients suffering from bone pains, hip dislocations, injuries and concerns over the DePuy ASR Hip Implant Recall that officially began in August of 2010. Texas hip replacement patients with the ASR implant devices in them have raised serious concerns about their blood cobalt levels and chromium levels and are rightly concerned about what the future holds for them.

Nobody looks forward to having a hip replacement, it is usually an option of last resort, especially with the long, slow recovery time and the pain and suffering that it is involved. Toxic cobalt levels have been linked to an inflammatory condition that is linked with necrosis of surrounding tissue and eventual bone loss in the hip joint.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently launched Web information pages to address the risks and side effects associated with metal-on-metal hip implants. A serious concern with metal hip implants is metallosis. Metallosis is the result of the body reacting to a metal implant. It occurs when the rubbing of metal-on-metal components releases cobalt and chromium ions into the bloodstream. The resulting local effect is inflammation and scarring around the implant. Other side effects associated with metal-on-metal hip implants include pain in the groin, hip or leg, swelling near the hip joint and a limp or change in walking ability.

The ASR Hip Resurfacing System and ASR XL Acetablular Systems were recalled after the devices were associated with higher failure rates than other models. A second, corrective surgery was needed in 12 to 13 percent of patients five years after the initial operation.

We currently have a client who was the recipient of bilateral DePuy ASR hips. Over the past few months she began to experience increasing pain in the hips joints. Simultaneously, it was noted she had elevated cobalt and chromium blood levels. Just last week, she had both DePuy hips removed and replaced in a lengthy operation.

I admire her courage to having both surgeries at the same time. She explained, that she had no choice, she was a care giver to an elderly mom and her husband and did not have the time to go through 2 separate hip surgeries, to deal with recovery and rehabilitation period, which could last several months. We spoke to her today, one week out of her surgery. She was recovering from the ordeal and was in good spirits.

Continue reading "DePuy ASR Hip Recall Metallosis Explanation" »

As a Dallas Antidepressant SSRI Birth Defects & Cranial Malformation Attorney, I am writing about the current state of SSRI induced birth defect lawsuits.

Selective seratonin reuptake inhibitor drugs are known as SSRI antidepressants.
Serious side effects are linked to the following antidepressants when taken while pregnant:

* Prozac®, * Xanax®, * Wellbutrin®, * Paxil®

Children born with heart birth defects, lung birth defects and other congenital birth defects have been linked to the possible use of a group of antidepressant drugs classified as Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitors (SSRI) by women during pregnancy. In a medical study, infants exposed to SSRI antidepressants during the first trimester of pregnancy had a 60% higher probability of developing congenital heart defects compared to newborns whose mothers did not take SSRI antidepressants.

According to the FDA, healthcare professionals are advised to carefully weigh the potential risks and benefits of using SSRI therapy in women during pregnancy and to discuss these findings as well as treatment alternatives with their patients.

Additional research recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine shows that use of anti-depressant medications during the latter half of pregnancy increases the risk the newborn will develop a serious respiratory disorder known as Persistent Pulmonary Hypertension (PPHN). When a newborn suffers from Persistent Pulmonary Hypertension (PPHN), the pulmonary arteries (blood vessels in the lungs) fail to fully open, and the newborn is unable to oxygenate his/her blood. Without an adequate supply of oxygen-rich blood, the infant can suffer serious complications.

Data from this study indicate that the use of Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) such as Prozac®, Zoloft® and Paxil® during the second half of pregnancy may increase the risk of Persistent Pulmonary Hypertension (PPHN) by as much as six times the normal risk.

The anti-depressant drugs – known as Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) include the following:

* Paxil® (paroxetine), * Zoloft® (sertraline), * Wellbutrin® (bupropion), * Celexa® (citalopram), * Cipralex® (escitalopram), * Luvox® (fluvoxamine), * Remeron® (mirtazapine), * Effexor® (venlafaxine), * Prozac® (fluoxetine)

Continue reading "Antidepressant SSRI Birth Defects & Cranial Malformations " »

Botox-maker Allergan Inc. was ordered by a federal court jury to pay $212 million to a Virginia man who alleged that use of the drug left him severely disabled.

The verdict awarded Douglas Ray, 67, $12M in compensatory damages and $200M in punitive damages. Ray was injected with the drug in 2007 to treat hand tremors. Ray suffered brain damage and now requires round-the-clock care. The suit, filed a VA federal court alleged that Allergan failed to adequately warn about the potential risks of Botox for off-label use.

Even if the decision by the jury is upheld, Allergan might have to pay only a small fraction of the penalty.Allergan said that Virginia state law caps punitive damages at $350,000. In September, Allergan agreed to pay the federal government $600 million to settle civil and criminal allegations that it illegally marketed and sold the drug through 2005 for unapproved uses, such as treating headaches.

Information and commentary provided by Dallas Fort Worth Personal Injury Attorney Dr Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be contacted in Dallas toll free at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you or a loved one has been injured from DANGEROUS DRUG SIDE EFFECT, please fill out our contact card for a free consultation.

As a DePuy ASR Replacement and Recall attorney I am providing this guide and update.
Over 90,000 US citizens are recipients of the recalled DePuy ASR DePuy hip implant. We think only a fraction of individuals with an ASR DePuy hip implant have been identified, because they do not want to go through the tough surgical ordeal again. Our goal is that we want to get all recipients of the recalled ASR DePuy hip implant identified, so that they get meaningful legal and medical help.

The ASR DePuy implants were widely used throughout the United States from 2005, until 2010. We are recommending every recipient, or family member of a recalled ASR DePuy hip implant to call us, if they are suffering pain, problems walking, swelling of the hip, or lack of flexibility. It has already been well documented that there is an extremely high failure rate for the ASR DePuy hip implants.

Women are reporting more problems, and a higher failure rate, with the DePuy ASR XL Acetabular hip replacement system. Women are also more likely to develop some of the serious side effects of the defectively designed implant, including metallosis.

Metallosis is a build-up of cobalt and chromium ions in the soft tissue of the body, particularly around the joints. Metallosis has been noted in people with all kinds of metal-on-metal joint implants and replacement systems. The engineering of the implant is causing far more friction, which leads to metallic debris being released into the tissue surrounding the implant.

The design of the ASR XL Acetabular system was developed to provide a greater range of motion. The DePuy engineers removed the plastic liner from the inside of the hip implant and made the acetabular cup shallow so that patients could move their legs in a wider arc.

The femoral head moves constantly back and forth as the hip implant's owner moves normally, and that puts stress on the acetabular cup. In an implant with a deeper acetabular cup than the DePuy ASR hip implant, there is more material to accommodate the strain of motion. The force is distributed over a bigger surface, which means that the implant overall can hold up to that strain better.

The already-shallow hip implant is made smaller overall to accommodate a woman's smaller frame. Women have naturally wider hips and larger hip sockets than men do, which means that the shallow acetabular cup becomes in effect even shallower.

And the smaller the surface area of the implant, the more likely the material will break down rapidly releasing metal ions into the body. Those metal ions accumulate in the soft tissues surrounding the hip joint, causing metallosis.

Women also more likely to see the problems that develop as a result of metallosis, including metal hypersensitivity, heavy metal poisoning (which includes chromium poisoning and cobalt poisoning) and tissue and bone deterioration.

Continue reading "DePuy ASR Hip Recall Guide and Metallosis Risk" »

As a Depuy ASR XL and ASR resurfacing hip recall attorney, I am trying to provide answers for my clients and potentials victims of the DePuy debacle.

If you are a victim of an ASR XL Acetabular System or an ASR Hip Resurfacing System, both of which were recalled by DePuy/Johnson & Johnson, you should expect financial compensation. In determining the amount of compensation you may be entitled to, you need to consider the following: the types of damages that available to people injured by defective products, and the recent results of a Sulzer hip implant lawsuit.

DePuy has promised, that it “…intends to cover reasonable and customary costs of treatment if you need services associated with the recall of ASR, including revision surgery if it is necessary.” DePuy names specific out-of-pocket expenses that it considers “reasonable,” including lost work time and travel expenses.

DePuy not provided any details on how, it intends to compensate you for the pain and suffering your DePuy hip replacement may have caused. To protect your legal rights, you should not call DePuy or sign any document the company provides without first speaking with a DePuy hip replacement attorney.

In a product liability case, a victim can recover economic damages (medical bills and lost wages) and non-economic damages (such as pain and suffering).

In 2000, Sulzer Orthopedics, Inc. recalled approximately 30,000 of its Inter-Op Acetabular Shell units. Because of a defective product, many recipients of this hip device required revision surgery, like with the DePuy hip recall. In 2002, Sulzer agreed to settle its class action and the company paid $1 billion to settle all the lawsuits. Those patients who required revision surgery were paid more than $200,000 each, and those who received faulty implants but did not undergo revision surgery received roughly $1,000 each. So time will tell regarding what DePuy will do and if history is going to be a guide.

We at this time do not know how the hundreds of DePuy ASR lawsuits will end up either through settlement or litigation. The fact is that taking legal action may be your only chance to recover financial compensation from DePuy. One thing is for certain, in mass tort cases, the companies usually settle, because it makes economic sense to do so and not because of any moral imperative or ethical considerations. It finally boils down to dollars and cents, like everything in life.

I have a client who is to undergo a double DePuy extraction next week, for cobaltism, metalosis and severe pain in both hips. She takes care of an elderly mother and her husband has chronic medical problems. She has been the main care giver to her family. Now with a double hip replacement, she will be the one who will require significant care and rehabilitation and she will need to make sure her family is taken cared of during her recovery, which could take as long as 6 months. The question she asks, will DePuy take care of her family diuring her rehabilitation? We have to wait and see.

Continue reading "Can I Get Compensation For a DePuy Hip Replacement Lawsuit?" »

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has dismissed an Agent Orange petition in a case originally brought by Vietnam veterans more than 30 years ago. This is a sad and tragic verdict for our men who gallantly fought for this country and who have been severely impacted by the diseases brought on by toxic exposure.

After their disability claims were denied, five veterans in 1979 filed a challenge to a 1978 Veterans' Administration publication suggesting that only limited claims could be brought based on chemical exposure to Agent Orange and other defoliants during the Vietnam War.

The Federal Circuit, after recounting the labyrinthine history of the case, ruled that it lacked jurisdiction because there was no court avenue for procedural challenges to Department of Veterans Affairs regulations until the 1988 Veterans' Judicial Review Act.

Agent Orange is the code name for one of the herbicides and defoliants used by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program, Operation Ranch Hand, during the Vietnam War from 1961 to 1971.

A 50:50 mixture of 2,4,5-T and 2,4-D, it was manufactured for the U.S. Department of Defense primarily by Monsanto Corporation and Dow Chemical. The 2,4,5-T used to produce Agent Orange was later discovered to be contaminated with 2,3,7,8-Tetrachlorodibenzodioxin, an extremely toxic dioxin compound. It was given its name from the color of the orange-striped 55 US gallon (200 L) barrels in which it was shipped.

Information and commentary provided by Dallas Fort Worth Personal Injury Attorney Dr Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be contacted in Dallas toll free at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you or a loved one has been injured from a truck accident, car crash or bus accident, please fill out our contact card for a free consultation.

Every day, we are hearing a lot of bad news about the osteoporosis drug Fosamax. Made by Merck & Co., Fosamax has been a successful bone disease treatment on the market for over a decade. In January 2009, medical studies were released that hit the drug and its manufacturer hard. The first study links Fosamax to osteonecrosis, of the jaw, and the second, links Fosamax to esophageal cancer. Are these reports the Titantic that is about to hit the Fosamax iceberg?

Fosamax works by attacking cells in the body responsible for bone breakdown, which can help patients dealing with osteoporosis. At the same time, if the drug is too efficient, it can cause the bone to grow too dense, which takes up inner bone space where bone marrow is found. Bone marrow is responsible for bone healing and growth, so without enough marrow, the bone will die. If you do break a bone that has been subjected to Fosamax and similar drugs it won't heal.

Medical studies linking the drug to esophageal cancer report that many of those affected had used the drug for over two years. One thing is certain - we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Fosamax injuries. Currently there are over 1,000 Fosamax lawsuits in litigation, and as more studies are done to confirm the allegations against the drug, we may see even more patients coming forward.

Fosamax, when used over time, can cause dead jaw, and Fosamax femur fractures have been a major problem in some cases. When you have osteoporosis, your bones become extremely fragile, and fractures can happen even with just a bump or gentle fall. Most often, fractures happen in the hips, spine, and wrists. If you break your hip, you typically need major surgery to fix it, and even then, you may have problems walking for the rest of your life. With spinal fractures, the same is true, and patients generally have back pain and may have to deal with deformities.

Fosamax and the following drugs Actonel (risedronate sodium) tablets, Actonel with Calcium (risedronate sodium with calcium carbonate tablets), Atelvia (risedronate sodium) delayed-release tablets, Boniva (ibandronate sodium) tablets, Fosamax (alendronate sodium) tablets and oral solution, Fosamax Plus D (alendronate sodium/cholecalciferol) Tablets, Reclast (zoledronic acid) Injections are now required to have clear warning labels regarding low-energy, or low trauma fractures of the femoral shaft (leg bone).

As a Fosamax osteoporosis attorney, I suggest discussing this drug with any elderly female friends and relatives as they may be unaware of the current crisis and the FDA's warnings.

Continue reading "Texas Titanic About to Hit The Fosamax Iceberg?" »

Lung Cancer, Mesothelioma and Asbestos Exposure

This article is one in a series of articles that I am writing as a Dallas Mesothelioma Attorney to educate folks about the man made toxins in the environment. Mesothelioma is called a “signature” disease—which indicates that the person was exposed to the causative agent. If someone has mesothelioma, they were almost certainly exposed to asbestos.

Mesothelioma rates continue to climb and by some estimates is set to peak around 2012-2015. Asbestos has been placed in many buildings as a fire retardant and insulator and now because of the long latency period, many contractors, pipe fitters and plumbers are coming down with the disease, some including folks who had exposure as long as 30-40 years ago. What a national tragedy.

Lung cancer, is a multi-factorial disease—Environmental factors are important in lung cancer causation. Lung cancer is cancer that starts in the lungs.

There are two main types of lung cancer:
Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is the most common type of lung cancer.
Small cell lung cancer makes up about 20% of all lung cancer cases. If the lung cancer is made up of both types, it is called mixed small cell/large cell cancer.

If the cancer started somewhere else in the body and spread to the lungs, it is called metastatic cancer to the lung.

The most important environmental factor is smoking. Asbestos exposure is important risk for development of lung cancer. Exposure to asbestos increases your risk of developing cancer—by an average of five times the risk of a non-smoker who was not exposed to asbestos.

Smoking makes a person ten times more likely to develop lung cancer. But for someone who smokes and was also exposed to asbestos, the risk of developing lung cancer is 50 times higher.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has included construction workers (including plumbers, electricians, painters and other construction-related trades), demolition workers, shipyard workers, firefighters and automobile mechanics among those at risk for dangerous asbestos exposures.

See NCI Asbestos Fact Sheet.

Continue reading "Mesothelioma And Asbestos Update" »

As a Texas Topamax Dangerous Drug attorney, I am providing this latest FDA warning regarding Topamax.

This latest announcement by the FDA (see below) is particularly worrisome, as it demonstrates the teratogenic side effects of Topamax and the generic versions of this commonly utilized drug.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a warning about Topamax (topiramate), an anticonvulsant medication which is used in the prevention of migraine headaches and epileptic seizures. New medical study shows that Topamax and its generic versions increases the rate of cleft lip and cleft palate deformities if taken by women who are pregnant.

Cleft lip and cleft palate deformities are holes in the roof of the mouth that result from improper fusing of the lip and the palate during fetal development during pregnancy. The mouth birth defects can cause problems with eating and talking if not treated with surgery.

Product labeling for Topamax cautions about the risk of birth defects associated with the medication, but the warning label will now be revised to include stronger language that there is "positive evidence of human fetal risk based on human data."

Cleft lip and palate is very treatable; however, the kind of treatment depends on the type and severity of the cleft.

Most children with a form of clefting are monitored by a cleft palate team or craniofacial team through young adulthood. Treatment procedures can vary between craniofacial teams. For example, some teams wait on jaw correction until the child is aged 10 to 12 (argument: growth is less influential as deciduous teeth are replaced by permanent teeth, thus saving the child from repeated corrective surgeries), while other teams correct the jaw earlier (argument: less speech therapy is needed than at a later age when speech therapy becomes harder).

Still prevention is better than the cure, so best avoid the use of Topamax during pregnancy or if cannot, then use contraceptive devices.

Continue reading "Topamax Seizure Drug Causes Birth Defects " »

Dallas Topamax Cleft Palate Cleft Lip Attorney warns about the side effects of Topamax during pregnancy.

As I have previously reported, the FDA has required the makers of Topamax and generic topiramate to update their warning label regarding use of the Topamax drug during pregnancy. The usage of Topamax during pregnancy, can cause children to be born with a cleft lip or cleft palate. And shockingly enough, it appears that this particular birth defect information has been available for years and that Topamax birth defect side effects may cause malformations. Folks, the manufacturers have failed to adequately research their medication or warn consumers and doctors.

The medical journal Neurology, in July 2008, reported that pregnant women who received Topamax for epilepsy treatment, faced an increased incidence of babies with birth defects or congenital malformations. Topamax use during pregnancy was linked to babies born with cleft lip or cleft palate at a rate 11 times higher than would be expected in the general population and babies born with genital defects at a rate 14 times higher than would be expected.

Apparently this research and other post-marketing data was available to the Topamax manufacturers, and they failed to warn women about the risks of pregnancy and Topamax. If proper warnings was provided, these women could have chosen to take a different drug or taken contraception to ensure they did not become pregnant while on Topamax.

According to reports made to the North American Antiepileptic Drug Pregnancy Registry, the prevalence of oral clefts in children born to mothers who used Topamax while pregnant was 20 times higher than among women who did not take any antiepiletic drug. When compared to other epilepsy drugs, the prevalence of birth defects was still 2-3 times greater with Topamax pregnancy use.

Because of the drug makers’ decision not to disclose this important information, there are many children who have experienced birth defect problems. Compensation may be available through a Topamax cleft palate or Topamax lip lawsuit for children who were exposed to the drug before they were born.

Continue reading "Topamax & Topiramate Usage Can Cause Birth Defects" »

As a Dallas Mesothelioma and Asbestos Attorney, I am reporting this Virgina Mesothelioma verdict against Exxon.

A jury awarded a former shipyard employee $25M in his lawsuit against Exxon for asbestos-related medical problems. The suit was filed against Exxon, the ship owner, rather than the parts supplier.

The lawsuit argued that Exxon knew about the problems with asbestos, and even developed rules to protect workers at refineries beginning in 1937, but did not warn shipyard workers or crew members.

An attorney for the worker said the case proved Exxon knew about the cancer link since the 1940s, and knew by the 1960s that it caused mesothelioma.

Asbestos is a carcinogenic fiber that causes lung cancer and mesothelioma, a rare and aggressive cancer of the lining of the body’s major organs and cavities. Asbestos was used in construction for over a century because of its versatility and heat resistance, making it an ideal insulator.

Continue reading "Exxon to Pay $25 M For Shipyard Worker Mesothelioma" »

As a Dallas Hip and Knee medical device product liability attorney I am providing this update regarding the Zimmer Durom Cup litigation involving premature hip replacement failure and the current DePuy metal on metal ASR hip replacement lawsuits.

For medical device makers, hip and knee replacements are increasing in the next few decades because of the surge in baby boomers. As a result we expect artificial hip and knees implant failures to increase.

In the Zimmer Durom Cup Product Liability Litigation, MDL NO. 2158, which is pending in the US District Court in Newark, New Jersey, the Court ordered all cases to proceed to mediation. Zimmer said they are anxious to settle for a "fair amount," which will include lost wages and medical bills and revision (or replacement) surgery as a result of failed Zimmer hip. The first mediation started in San Francisco and mediations will follow nationwide so that the Zimmer victims can meet with Zimmer representatives.

The Durom Cup was implanted in more than 12,000 patients in the US between 2006 and 2008. In July 2008, Zimmer announced that it was temporarily suspending sales of the Durom Cup in the US, but denied any "evidence of a defect with its product." The complaint alleges that the failure rate of the Durom Cup is between 20 percent and 30 percent and likely will climb much higher in the next few years.

Now we have litigation that has commenced with the DePuy metal on metal ASR hip replacements. These Johnson and Johnson metal on metal ASR hips also fail at an unacceptable rate. These cases have been consolidated in the Northern District of Ohio federal court MDL.

Continue reading "DePuy Hip and Knee Replacement Lawsuits" »

As a Dallas Toxic Tort attorney I am providing this environmental pollution story.
Conroe Texas is ground zero in a battle between this Houston city, and EPA regulators against Texas environmental officials who approved an underground landfill. In Conroe, the fear is of contaminated water that could cause permanent harm to the only water source for the half-million residents in Montgomery County. And that aquifer feeds additional underground streams that provide water to millions of people in 54 counties.

"Once your water is dirty, you'll never get it clean again," said Rebecca Kaiser, a Conroe resident.

TexCom Gulf Disposal LLC, wants to inject liquid commercial waste into a well underground, that could include cancer-causing benzene and other toxic chemicals. This injection well is less than a mile from hundreds of homes and several schools.

The proposed waste site in Conroe is an oil field with hundreds of abandoned wells. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is concerned that these wells could act as a pathway for the waste to travel to aquifers, and contaminate the drinking water.

There have been many similar problems in Texas, for example in Winona — an East Texas town where a company was forced to close its injection well in 1997 because of spills that residents alleged increased cancer rates and birth defects.

Also in 2005 in Chico, a North Texas town, where waste from an injection well bubbled up through other wells. Finally radioactivity forced the shutdown of municipal water wells.

Continue reading "Conroe, Texas Toxic Landfill Could Contaminate Drinking Water" »

As a DePuy ASR Hip Recall attorney, I would to update the recipients of faulty DePuy ASR hip implants not to preserve their legal rights as Johnson & Johnson offers an early hip replacement settlement.

Before you accept this early hip replacement settlement offer, please seek a second opinion from a knowledgeable and experienced DePuy attorney.

DePuy considers certain minor medical expenses reasonable for patients that experience DePuy hip side effects. But a DePuy hip lawsuit is necessary to get compensation for past, present and future medical therapies, lost wages, pain and suffering.

A second implant surgery is necessary for some patients because of a high failure rate for two of their devices. The DePuy Hip Recall includes the DePuy ASR Hip Resurfacing system and the ASR XL Acetabular Cup system.

Medical reports suggest that one in eight patients will require a revision surgery within five years of their first implant.

This DePuy hip recall litigation suggests that patients will be observed closely for any side effects in the foreseeable future, including continued pain, inflammation, metallosis, difficulty walking or other DePuy ASR hip replacement side effects.

Continue reading "DePuy ASR Recall And Replacement Update" »

As a Dallas Fort Worth Toxic Injury attorney I am providing this information regarding toxic pollution of our natural resources and drinking water.

Thousands of internal documents obtained by The New York Times from the EPA, state regulators and drillers show that the dangers of fracking to the environment and health are greater than previously understood.

The documents reveal that the wastewater, which is sometimes hauled to sewage plants not designed to treat it and then discharged into rivers that supply drinking water, contains radioactivity at levels higher than previously known, and far higher than the level that federal regulators say is safe for these treatment plants to handle.

The Times also found never-reported studies by the E.P.A. and a confidential study by the drilling industry that all concluded that radioactivity in drilling waste cannot be fully diluted in rivers and other waterways.
Read Article: The New York Times

As a Dallas Fort Worth Asbestos Mesothelioma Attorney, I am providing this promising new cancer regimen for devastating mesothelioma disease.

Southwest Oncology Group (SWOG), a consortium of 19 cancer testing centers, is in the process of conducting Phase 1/Phase 2 trials on the use of cediranib maleate in combination with pemetrexed disodium (marketed as Alimta) and cisplatin to treat mesothelioma patients who have not received previous chemotherapy treatment.

Mesothelioma is caused by inhaling or ingesting asbestos fibers. At least 2,500 Americans are diagnosed with this deadly disease each year, most in the final stages. A typical prognosis for mesothelioma, at this stage, is about a year to live.

Mesothelioma, which occurs in 3 out of 4 cases in the mesothelial lining around the lungs, is often treated with surgery, radiation and chemotherapy, or a combination of, but most treatments are considered palliative rather than curative. That is, they reduce pain and improve breathing, but in most cases do not extend lifetimes beyond a few months at best. Pemetrexed and cisplatin, a platinum-based compound, are the chemicals of choice for treating mesothelioma.

The addition of cediranib maleate (sometimes called AZD2171, or Recentin), because of its ability to block the delivery of needed enzymes and blood to cancer cells, is expected to improve the performance of the Alimta/cisplatin package of chemotherapy agents.

Continue reading "Promising New Cancer Therapy for Mesothelioma" »

As a Fort Worth Accutane Inflammatory bowel disease attorney, I am writing about the upcoming trial in New Jersey state court. These trials have been anticipated for a long time and will inject Hollywood into the proceedings, as one of the plaintiffs is a film actor.

Trial will began this week in New Jersey state court, for three plaintiffs who allege that they suffered severe bowel disease from Accutane.

Roche faces 3,000 Accutane bowel lawsuits, which all involve allegations that the drug maker failed to adequately warn users about the potential risk of injury associated with the acne medication. The plaintiffs claim there is an increased risk of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) from Accutane (isotretinoin), which could lead to ulcerative colitis, and Crohn’s disease.

Roche has lost all six Accutane trials that have previously reached a jury.

The number of Accutane complaints filed in New Jersey continues to increase as former users discover that there may be a connection between their bowel problems and Accutane.

The next Accutane trial is scheduled in May 2011, and involves a case filed by Kamie Kendall. The earlier verdict was reversed on appeal because Roche was denied introducing evidence about the number of individuals who have used the acne medication over the years.

Continue reading "Roche Accutane Inflammatory Bowel Disease Trials" »

As a Fort Worth Darvon, Darvocet and Propoxyphene recall attorney I am providing this update regarding the upcoming MDL hearing, presently set for late March in California.

There is going to be a hearing that will decide whether all Darvon and Darvocet lawsuits should be consolidated for pretrial proceedings as part of an MDL, or multidistrict litigation in federal court.

The U.S. Judicial Panel on MDL (JPML)has set a hearing for March 30th in San Diego, where they will consider the proposed consolidation of the Darvon and Darvocet litigation.

There are currently at least four different lawsuits over Darvocet that have been filed against Xanodyne Pharmaceuticals in three different federal district courts.

All of the suits contain allegations that the manufacturer failed to adequately research the side effects of Darvocet and Darvon and failed to warn doctors and patients that propoxyphene-based drugs caused heart rhythm problems that could sometimes be fatal.

A Darvon and Darvocet recall was issued on November 19, 2010, after the FDA determined that propoxyphene-based painkillers may increase the risk of heart rhythm abnormalities, including heart arrhythmias or sudden heart-related death.

Multidistrict litigation, and centralization is common in complex product liability claims involving a large number of lawsuits over injuries associated with a particular product. The process is designed to avoid duplicate discovery, prevent inconsistent rulings by different judges and to promote the efficient litigation of the cases.

Xanodyne has opposed consolidation of the Darvocet litigation, stating that much of the evidence and discovery in the cases will focus on the individual health of each plaintiff. The company also stated that some plaintiffs took versions of Darvon or Darvocet that were not made by Xanodyne, and so arguing that the Xanodyne could not be held liable in these cases.

Furthermore, Xanodyne argues that the cases should be centralized in the Eastern District of Kentucky, where the drug maker is headquartered.

Continue reading "Darvocet, Darvon, and Propoxyphene MDL March Hearing" »

As a Dallas Benzene Cancer attorney I am providing this information blog because I have recently talked to some potential plaintiffs who believe that they may have been exposed to Benzene and that their cancers may be related to this industrial exposure.

Benzene is an aromatic hydrocarbon that is produced by the burning of natural products. It is a component of products derived from coal and petroleum and is found in gasoline and other fuels. Benzene is used in the manufacture of plastics, detergents, pesticides, and other chemicals. Research has shown benzene to be a carcinogen (cancer-causing). With exposures from less than five years to more than 30 years, individuals have developed, and died from, leukemia. Long-term exposure may affect bone marrow and blood production. Short-term exposure to high levels of benzene can cause drowsiness, dizziness, unconsciousness, and death.

Benzene is addressed in specific standards for the general industry, shipyard employment, and the construction industry.

Individuals employed in industries that make or use benzene may be exposed to the highest levels of benzene. These industries include benzene production (petrochemicals, petroleum refining, and coke and coal chemical manufacturing), rubber tire manufacturing, and storage or transport of benzene and petroleum products containing benzene. Other workers who may be exposed to benzene because of their occupations include steel workers, printers, rubber workers, shoe makers, laboratory technicians, firefighters, and gas station employees.

Continue reading "Benzene Cancer Update" »

Mesothelioma is a deadly disease that is caused by exposure to asbestos, which is a naturally occurring silicate mineral that exists, in a fibrous state composed of microscopic crystals. Asbestos was used in a variety of building applications, as a heat insulator, electrical resistant insulator, and as a composite material in joint compound and concrete.

Mesothelioma litigation represents the longest running Mass Tort in the history of America. Every year, 10,000 people die from mesothelioma, and 800,000 claimants have sought compensation against approximately 8,400 defendants.

Most people who develop mesothelioma have worked on jobs where they inhaled asbestos and glass particles, or they have been exposed to asbestos dust and fiber in other ways. It has also been suggested that washing the clothes of a family member who worked with asbestos or glass can put a person at risk for developing mesothelioma. Unlike lung cancer, there is no association between mesothelioma and smoking, but smoking greatly increases the risk of other asbestos-induced cancers

Mesothelioma is a type of cancer that attacks the thin layer of cells that line the body's internal organs, known as mesothelium.

Mesothelioma disease exists in three forms. The most common type is pleural mesothelioma, and this disease accounts for approximately 70% of all mesothelioma cases. Pleural mesothelioma occurs in the lining of the lungs, known as pleura.

The second variety of mesothelioma, pericardial mesothelioma, occurs in the lining of the heart, known as the pericardium.

The third form, peritoneal mesothelioma occurs in the lining of the abdominal cavity, known as peritoneum.

Continue reading "Asbestos Mesothelioma Update" »

As a Dallas DePuy ASR Recall attorney I am providing this important update regarding the recent MDL hearing in Florida.

Johnson & Johnson and plaintiff attorneys are negotiating a procedure for preserving and handling company’s recalled hip implant devices after patients get them replaced through surgeries. J&J’s DePuy Orthopaedics unit recalled the implants on Aug. 26, after researchers found a second operation, or “revision surgery,” was needed after five years at rates higher than the company expected. Doctors had implanted 37,000 ASR XL Acetabular System devices.

The implants and tissue removed are important evidence in the individual lawsuits by DePuy patients. The protocol for handling and analyzing the explants, will help document excessive metal wear of the device and the destructive tissue damage caused by the debris.

The devices, known as metal-on-metal implants, had defective designs that caused cobalt and chromium debris resulting in tissue death, fractures, and other injuries known as metalosis.

Hundreds of lawsuits have been filed in federal court and state courts in California and New Jersey. Federal cases filed around the country are being transferred to Toledo.

J&J was “negligent in marketing and selling ASR implants despite knowing that the joints would more likely than not fail prematurely as compared to other prosthetic hip implants and expose patients to unreasonably high risk of serious bodily injury,” according to a recent complaint.

The case is In re: DePuy Orthopaedics Inc. ASR Hip Implant Products, 10-md-2197, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Ohio (Toledo).

As a Fort Worth Toxic Tort and Environmental Attorney I am providing this update regarding diesel fracking.

According to U.S. House Democrats, Halliburton Co. and Baker Hughes' BJ Services are among 12 oil and gas companies using diesel fuel in hydraulic fracturing, potentially violating the law.

The providers injected 32.2 million gallons of unauthorized diesel fuel, or fluids containing the fuel, to extract gas from wells in 19 states from 2005 to 2009, according to a letter to Environmental Protection Agency. BJ Services led with 11.5 million gallons followed by Halliburton at 7.2 million.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee began its investigation of fracturing in February 2010. The panel concluded that 12 of 14 companies questioned used diesel fuel or fluids containing diesel in 19 states.

Texas, where North Texas' Barnett Shale is the nation's No. 1 natural gas source and the Eagle Ford Shale in South and Central Texas is a growing resource, accounted for half of the total. Companies also used at least 1 million gallons of diesel-containing fluids in Oklahoma, Wyoming, North Dakota, Louisiana and Colorado.

Companies using hydraulic fracturing -- a technique that shoots water, sand and chemicals into shale to extract natural gas -- aren't required to get permits unless they use fluids containing diesel, which the EPA said is a threat to drinking water.

The EPA is collecting information as part of a study into the effects of hydraulic fracturing on drinking water.

Environmental groups led by the New York-based Natural Resources Defense Council said the chemicals used are often toxic, citing cases in Wyoming and Pennsylvania where residents were told not to drink well water.

Continue reading "Oil and Gas Drillers Accused of Using Diesel In Fracking" »

As a Fort Worth Toxic Tort Groundwater contamination attorney I am providing this update on the Camp Lejeune litigation.
A former Marine has filed a $16 million lawsuit against the federal government, claiming that contaminated water at Camp Lejeune caused him to contract a rare form of breast cancer.

It is the latest damage claim in a long-running dispute between former residents and the Marine Corps over the polluted water.

Wells at the base were contaminated by fuel leaks and other sources of pollution before being closed two decades ago. Health officials think as many as 1 million people may have been exposed to tainted water.

Continue reading "Marine Files Lawsuit Over Toxic Camp Lejeune Water" »

As a Fort Worth Product Liability and Defective drug attorney I am reporting this latest warning from the FDA involving the drug, Multaq.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said that it has received several reports of liver damage with Multaq tablets, including two cases in which patients had to have their livers removed.

Both female patients were 70 years old, and they had been taking the drug for 4.5 months and six months, respectively.

The FDA said it would add a new warning about the risk for liver damage to the label of Multaq. Multaq already carries a black box warning, the most severe type, stating the drug can cause severe complications, including death, in people with recent severe heart failure and should not be used in those patients.

Sanofi-Aventis SA, the manufacturer of the medication, will send a letter to US doctors telling them that two patients taking the Multaq (dronedarone) medication have suffered liver failure.

Multaq, cleared for sale in 2009, treats atrial fibrillation, a rapid and irregular beating in the heart's upper chambers affecting an estimated two million people in the US, according to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

According to the FDA, patients taking the drug should call their doctor if they experience symptoms such as itching, yellow eyes or skin, dark urine, loss of appetite, or light-colored stools,

Continue reading "FDA Multaq Dronedarone: Risk of Severe Liver Injury" »

As a Fort Worth DePuy Hip Recall and Injury Attorney I am providing this DePuy Litigation update.

The DePuy Product Liability Attorneys involved with the DePuy Recall and class action lawsuits are scheduled to meet with the federal judge that is presiding over the multi-district litigation (MDL) on January 20th.

In December, a U.S. Judicial Panel ruled to consolidate all federal DePuy hip recall lawsuits in the Northern District of Ohio. The meeting scheduled for January will allow the Judge to select which attorneys will serve in leadership roles for the plaintiffs and the defendants.

Over 100 DePuy hip recall lawsuits have already been transferred to the MDL Court, and thousands more are expected to be filed or transferred in the coming months.

The claims are being consolidated in an effort to reduce the burden on the court system. All of the cases that have been and will be filed under the MDL will have similar allegations against a common defendant, DePuy Orthopedics and its parent company Johnson & Johnson. Many claims will be seeking similar damages resulting from similar injuries and much of the same discovery will be applicable to a majority of the claims.

DePuy ASR hip implants were recalled by DePuy last year after it was discovered that the metal on metal implants had an extremely high rate of failure, but most of damage had already been done. Over 90,000 people world wide were implanted with the defective devices between the 2005 launch and the recall some five years later. It is estimated that about 35,000 defective DePuy hips were implanted in the United States alone.

Patients implanted with a recalled DePuy hip implant may still be at risk for problems related to the release of small particles from the metal-on-metal devices, even if they have not experienced pain or other symptoms. Therefore, if you have received an implant involved in the DePuy hip replacement recall, do not wait until you experience symptoms of DePuy hip problems to learn your legal rights.

Continue reading "DePuy Hip Recall Lawyers and MDL Court Meeting in January" »

As a Fort Worth DePuy ASR Hip Recall attorney I am providing this latest update information involving the recent DePuy Class Action lawsuits.

The DePuy Articular Surface Replacement (ASR) hip, is failing at high rates, even though the device was designed to last for at least 15 years.

According to medical critics the failure of the ASR hip demonstrates a broken piecemeal medical implant system.

Medical implants can be sold without testing if a device, like an artificial hip, resembles an implant already approved. This is different from new drugs, which have go through a series of rigorous clinical trials before receiving approval from the Food and Drug Administration.

Until summer of 2010, DePuy Orthopaedics, stated that the A.S.R. was performing similarly toother hip devices. But doctors indicated that DePuy received repeated warnings that the implant was failing at an alarming rate.

Read full story here at the New York Times

Information and commentary provided by Dallas Fort Worth DePuy Class Action Attorney Dr Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be contacted in Dallas toll free at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you or a loved one has been injured from a DePuy Hip Implant, please fill out our contact card for a free consultation.

Click here for Map and location.

As a Fort Worth Toxic Tort attorney I am reporting this toxic air and ground water pollution story.

Two Texas environmental groups have filed a lawsuit against Exxon Mobile Corp over excessive pollution from the company's Baytown refinery. The lawsuit claims the 8 million pounds of pollution released from the refinery over the last five years equates to "over 2,500 violations of the U.S. Clean Air Act." The lawsuit could result in more than $80 million in fines against Exxon,

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6BD35920101214

Information and commentary provided by Dallas Fort Worth Personal Injury Attorney Dr Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be contacted in Dallas toll free at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you or a loved one has been injured from environmental pollution, please fill out our contact card for a free consultation.

Click here for Map and location.

Information and commentary provided by Dallas Fort Worth DePuy Hip Injury Attorney Dr Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be contacted in Dallas at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you or a loved one has been injured from a defective DePuy Hip, please fill out our contact card for a free consultation regarding your defective product liability claim. Click here for Map and location.

A judicial panel has decided that all pretrial proceedings in federal lawsuits against Johnson & Johnson over recalled hip-replacement devices will be overseen by the Federal Court in Ohio. Once pretrial proceedings are completed, the individual cases are sent back for trial in the courts where they were first filed.

U.S. District Judge Katz in Toledo, Ohio, will supervise evidence-gathering efforts in cases over the ASR XL Acetabular System.

DePuy recalled both the ASR XL Acetabular System, a total hip-replacement product approved by U.S. Food and Drug Administration in August 2005, and the DePuy ASR Hip Resurfacing System.

New Brunswick, New Jersey-based J&J, and Warsaw, Indiana-based DePuy said they recalled the devices after researchers found many patients needed “revision surgery” after five years because of design defects.

Researchers in the U.K. found that, 13 percent of patients with complete hip replacements and 12 percent with resurfacing devices needed a second operation.

Other medical-device makers have faced costly product-liability cases in the past over hip-replacement systems.

Sulzer AG agreed in 2001 to a $1 billion settlement of suits alleging hip and knee implants made by its former Sulzer Medica unit were defective.

In the DePuy litigation, there are allegations of toxic exposure to trace elements, chromium and cobalt. A DePuy victim's damages include revision surgery to get the metal-on-metal implant out, systemic reaction to the excessive metal load in their body, bone loss around the implant, metal debris and metal ions in their tissues causing necrosis of the tissue, chromium and cobalt poisoning, non-malignant tumors, and increased risk of cancer.

Serious allegations indeed.

As a DePuy Hip Replacement Lawsuit - Hip Recall Lawyer, I updating this information involving 2 Class action lawsuits that were filed recently in Canada against the manufacturers of the recalled defective hip replacement systems.

One of the complaints, was filed against DePuy Orthopaedics and this DePuy ASR lawsuit is seeking to represent all Canadians who received the recalled metal-on-metal hip replacement system.

The other hip replacement lawsuit was filed in Calgary, Halifax and Montreal against DePuy, Zimmer and Stryker. This complaint alleges that these manufacturing companies released the recalled defective hip replacement systems.

The DePuy ASR Hip Resurfacing System, the DePuy ASR XL Acetabular Hip System, the Zimmer Durom Cup, the Stryker Trident Acetabular PSL Cup and the Stryker Trident Hemispherical Cup are all being targeted.

The DePuy ASR hip failures appear to be linked to a defective design of the acetabular cup, which is shallower than acetabular cups made by other companies.

The Zimmer Durom Cup hip implant was supposedly designed as a more advanced form of a hip resurfacing system.

But after Zimmer introduced the Durom Cup in the United States, many concerns emerged about a high number of hip replacement failures involving the hip implant. Claims made in Zimmer Durom Cup lawsuits suggests that the artificial hip failure rate is between 20% and 30%.

The U.S. federal Zimmer Durom Cup recall litigation has been consolidated in the District of New Jersey as part of a multidistrict litigation (MDL).

The Stryker Trident Cup is a ceramic-on-ceramic hip replacement system. A Stryker Trident recall was issued in January 2008, after it was discovered that manufacturing problems may have resulted in some parts not meeting the proper standards for sterility.

The first of many hearings on the DePuy ASR XL hip implants lawsuits against Johnson & Johnson was held in Durham, North Carolina on November 18, 2010.

The U.S. Judicial Panel for Multidistrict Litigation, JPML, heard arguments from defense lawyers for Johnson and Johnson and the plaintiffs attorneys for the affected and injured consumers.

This hearing will determine where the lawsuits should be coordinated for pretrial management, and which judge should be assigned to handle the cases.

The most significant health risk from the metallic hip is the exposure to patients of high levels of chromium and cobalt metal debris from the implants. The faulty and defective design of the ASR XL prosthetic hip leads to excessive pressure on the edges of the cup, causing extensive wear and tear and this leads to the release of ionic metal debris into the patients hip.

According to the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery Metallosis is usually defined as aseptic fibrosis, local necrosis, or loosening of a device secondary to metallic corrosion and release of wear debris.

Chromium and cobalt are natural trace elements which the body requires for healthy function. The chromium and cobalt ions released by the DePuy ASR metal on metal grinding joint, are toxic to the tissues in the hip.

Chromium and cobalt exposures in industrial settings have been demonstrated by medical studies, and that these metals are highly toxic to the liver, kidneys, and brain tissue.

Information and commentary is provided by Dallas and Fort Worth DePuy ASR Hip Recall Attorney Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be reached in Dallas at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you have questions about a DePuy ASR Hip Recall, please fill out our contact online for a free consultation.

As a Fort Worth Texas Dilantin Stevens Johnson Syndrome SJS attorney, we are providing this update.

Dilantin (Generic: Phenytoin) is an antiepileptic drug prescribed to manage seizures. A major side effect of Dilantin is a severe skin reaction called Stevens Johnson Syndrome (SJS).

Stevens Johnson Syndrome involves the skin and the mucous membranes and is a serious systemic disorder with the potential for severe illness and even death.

With Stevens Johnson Syndrome, a patient develops blistering of mucous membranes, usually in the mouth, eyes, and genitals. Nearly all cases are caused by a drug reaction, most commonly sulfa antibiotics, barbiturates, anti-seizure medication such as Dilantin and certain non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. The disorder occurs in all age groups but is more common in older people and people of African American descent.

Information and commentary is provided by Dallas and Fort Worth Dilantin Stevens Johnson Syndrome Attorney Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be reached in Dallas at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you have questions about drug induced Stevens Johnson Syndrome, please fill out our contact for online for a free consultation.

Continue reading "Dilantin Stevens Johnson Syndrome SJS Attorney" »

As a Fort Worth Dilantin Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis Syndrome Attorney, we are providing an update on Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis Syndrome (TENS).

Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis (TEN), is a more severe form of Stevens Johnson Syndrome (SJS) with death and illness rates that are much higher than SJS.

Like SJS, TEN Syndrome are an immune complex-mediated hypersensitivity complex that involves the skin and mucous membranes. There is significant involvement of oral, nasal, eye, vaginal, urethral, GI, and lower respiratory tract mucous membranes.

Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis (TENS) is a very serious, and life threatening disease. In these cases lead to mucosal scarring and loss of function of the involved organ system leaving the patient blind and unable to breathe, eat or speak on their own.

Information and commentary is provided by Dallas and Fort Worth Dilantin Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis Attorney Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be reached in Dallas at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you have questions about Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis or Stevens Johnson Syndrome, please fill out our contact for online for a free consultation.

As an internal medicine resident, ER physician and practicing physician, I have encountered and treated some mild cases of Stevens Johnson Syndrome and Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis, TENS, medical conditions.

Now as a Fort Worth Steven Johnson Syndrome and Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis lawyer, we are providing this update.

Dilantin, Depakote, Levaquin and Non Steroidal Anti Inflammatory drugs are among some of the drugs that may cause Stevens-Johnson Syndrome (SJS).

Dilantin and Depakote are anti-epileptic and anti-convulsion drugs which can cause Stevens-Johnson Syndrome.

These drugs – Dilantin, Depakote, Levaquin and Motrin have serious side effects, among them aching, headaches, and fever followed by a red rash and blisters. This could be a sign of Stevens-Johnson Syndrome, a rare but fatal skin disorder. Stevens Johnson Syndrome is a life-threatening skin disease that can cause rashes, skin peeling, and blisters on the body's mucous membranes.

Stevens-Johnson Syndrome (SJS) and Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis (TEN) are two versions of the same disease, distinguished from each other by severity. Both are hypersensitive life-threatening skin reactions.

Information and commentary is provided by Dallas and Fort Worth Steven Johnson Syndrome and Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis lawyer, Shezad Malik. The Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm can be reached in Dallas at 888-210-9693 or in Fort Worth at 817-900-8439. If you have questions about Steven Johnson Syndrome and Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis, please fill out our contact for online for a free consultation.

MDL Panel Hearing For Texas DePuy Hip Replacement Litigation

The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) is meeting on November 18 in Durham, North Carolina.to centralize all federal DePuy ASR recall lawsuits.

The DePuy metal-on-metal hip was recalled after medical data suggested that about one out of every 8 people, if not more, who received the artificial hip may have their DePuy ASR hip fail within five years.

Some plaintiffs are seeking to have the cases consolidated in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey under Judge Susan D. Wigenton, where many of the cases are currently pending.

The DePuy ASR hip failures appear to be linked to a defective design of the acetabular cup, making it prone to problems.

The benefits of a MDL include a reduction in duplicative discovery among thousands of similar cases, avoid conflicting rulings from judges in different districts.

As a Texas Benzene Cancer Exposure Attorney, I frequently write articles about this new scourge of the 21st century.

I firmly believe, based on my medical knowledge, that all this drilling and fracking for oil and gas is setting us up for a new wave of benzene induced cancers, particularly leukemias.

Earlier this year, there was a huge gas leakage at BP’s Texas City refinery, which led to the company having to flare gases. As the company worked to fix the leakage, approximately 530,000 pounds of noxious pollutants were released into the Texas City air. This included 17,000 pounds of benzene, a known carcinogen.

BP never informed the public about this leak that was spread out over 40 days.

Many thousands of Texas City residents have complained about the effects of that exposure to benzene, including respiratory difficulties, sinus infections, as well as headaches and nosebleeds. These are acute benzene exposure symptoms.

But the real danger may not manifest itself for years down the road, when folks would have forgotten about this benzene leakage into the environment. Benzene-induced leukemia has a usual latency period of 5 to 15 years and, in many cases, is preceded by aplastic anemia.

Folks, we are talking about acute and chronic leukemias, which will kill you.

As a Fort Worth Benzene Toxic Spill attorney, I read with interest the following article regarding BP's petroleum operations in Alaska. The last pristine wild-life area in the world is at great risk for an environmental disaster of immense proportions. This another in a series of articles that I am writing regarding the toxic exposure we are experiencing.

The huge pipeline system that moves oil, gas and waste throughout BP's petroleum operations in Alaska, has severe corrosion, according to an internal report.

The report states that 148 BP pipelines on Alaska's North Slope have received an "F-rank' from the company.

Most of those lines carry toxic or flammable substances, and many of the metal walls of the F-ranked pipes are worn to within a few thousandths of an inch of bursting, according to the document, risking an explosion or spills.

Read Article: The Washington Post

As a Dallas Depuy Hip Recall Attorney, I am fielding many calls from concerned plaintiffs regarding their implanted DePuy ASR Metal on Metal Hip prosthesis.

Many plaintiffs are understandably concerned, about what to do next once they receive a certified letter from their orthopedic doctor, allegedly ghost written by DePuy.

Many folks are asked to get a blood test and are asked to sign over their hip surgery medical records. Patients with the metal hip devices have suffered pain and inflammation from device malfunction, and have endured metallosis when the grinding of metal parts in the hip implants releases cobalt and chromium into their bloodstream.

Folks you are not alone, you need to preserve your legal rights and have your case evaluated by an experienced product liability attorney.

I had one just call today, from a man who is suffering terribly from his 2 year old hip surgery. He had never sued anybody and did not know what to next.

He had received the correspondence from his doctors and a request for a blood test. He was confused and upset because he knows that he will have to undergo another painful hip surgery, and he knows he will have a long road to recovery, pain and suffering and finally may lose his job.

He is the only bread winner in his family and knows if he loses his job, he will have no health insurance to pay for the new hip, which can cost up $150,000.

As a Fort Worth Benzene Lawsuit Attorney, I have been writing over the past month a series of stories on the Environment and Toxicity.

According to a new study, mothers who live in Texas neighborhoods with higher levels of benzene, a pollutant from refineries and tailpipes, are more likely to have babies with a serious neurological defects.

Texas leads the nation in benzene releases, accounting for more than 34% of emissions.

This study for the first time, links benzene to a neurological birth defect and demonstrates that air pollution can harm a fetus.

Researchers from the UT School of Public Health and Texas Dept of State Health Services conducted the study, which appeared in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.
Houston Chronicle 10/28/2010

Read Article: Houston Chronicle

As a Dallas DePuy Recall attorney I am concern about the risks of Cobalt and Chromium poisoning, resulting from the metal on metal grinding of the DePuy ASR Prosthetic Hips.

In August of this year, DePuy Orthopaedics Inc., recalled the ASR metal-on-metal hip replacement system, admitting that about one out of every eight patients who receives the hip implant may experience early hip failure within five years. The actual ratio of defective hips may be as high as one out of five or 20%, or even higher.

Structeral design and manufacturing problems with the DePuy metal-on-metal hip replacement system allow the toxic release of chromium and cobalt to be absorbed into the blood-stream.

Tests have demonstrated that levels of chromium and cobalt can be 100 times higher than normal, and the patients have had soft tissue and muscle inflammation and benign tumors develop, called pseudo-tumors.

Chromium and Cobalt toxicity has been linked to cancer, and other severe medical conditions associated with heavy metal toxicity.

Many individual and 2 class action law suits have been filed, the most recent in Northern District of Ohio Federal Court, on September 30.

In September, a motion was filed with the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) to consolidate and centralize the DePuy ASR recall litigation. The panel will hear arguments on the motion in early November.

If an MDL is formed, all federal cases filed in different districts throughout the United States will be transferred to one judge for coordinated handling during pretrial litigation.

Tags: Class Action, DePuy, DePuy ASR, Depuy ASR Hip, Hip Implant, Johnson & Johnson, Metal-on-Metal Hip, Product Liability, Texas DePuy Recall.

As a Fort Worth DePuy Hip Product Liability attorney I took an interesting potential client inquiry. The woman had hip replacement and she has noticed that her hair is falling out in clumps, suggesting toxic metal ion poisoning., which is described below.

DePuy XL ASR Prosthetic Hips are unique, in that they involve metal on metal grinding during a patient's ambulation. While the metal design may have have sounded good in theory, they have turned out horribly bad in clinical practice.

Patients then develop 2 types of problems. The repetitive grinding motion, leads to microscopic wearing down of the articular surfaces and the release of metallic ions, particularly cobalt and chromium, into the tissues surrounding the hip. The metal becomes fatigued and leads to early failure.

Also there is the resultant loosening and dislocation of the device resulting in the need for early hip revision surgery and/or the release of metal debris causing tissue damage.

This absorption of metallic ions in the tissues, leads to an inflammatory reaction, resulting in pain, swelling and immobility. The absorption of metallic ions into the bloodstream leads to cobalt and chromium toxicity. Polyneuropathy is caused by cobalt–chromium metallosis after total hip replacement. Read the article here.

artificial hip joint; biopsy; metal intoxication; polyneuropathy; toxic neuropathy

Continue reading "DePuy Hip ASR And Metallosis" »

Today as a Fort Worth DePuy ASR Hip Lawsuit attorney, I took in a case for DePuy ASR product liability lawsuits that we are filing.

Johnson and Johnson acknowledged in August, with the withdrawal from the market their artificial hips, that there are problems with high failure rates, metal on metal grinding and release of metal ions into the joints.

Now class actions lawsuits are being filed across the nation.

Approximately 30,000 DePuy hips have been implanted in the US alone. There is a Fort Worth orthopedic group that has implanted 800, over the past 6 years.

DePuy is paying orthopedic doctors $50 to hand over their patients medical records and grabbing the artificial joints when they get removed. Both of these acts should be resisted at all costs. This is unethical, and you risk the loss of key evidence of a defective product. We are storing our clients DePuy artificial hips in storage bottled containing formalin.

I would encourage all patients who have had a DePuy hip implanted to seek legal advice, and to safeguard their legal rights. If you have one of the DePuy ASR hip systems, you have the potential of a legal claim. Potential recoveries include compensation for your medical bills, lost wages and your pain and suffering.

Continue reading "Fort Worth Artificial Hip With DePuy ASR Replacement?" »

Not a day goes by when one reads of a story of an accidental oil and gas spillage or leakage into the ground, our water ways or the ocean. The BP Oil Spill is one major example. All over the United States, on a daily basis there are folks who are getting exposed to toxic chemicals.

As a Fort Worth Benzene Lawsuit attorney, my job is to provide to the public education, knowledge and help to help folks who have been exposed to these toxic chemicals. I hope to write a series of blog articles to highlight the various poisons that we are releasing, knowingly or accidentally into our environment.

The first is on Benzene Toxic Exposure.

Benzene is a known carcinogen in humans and causes cancer. Breathing benzene vapors can cause immediate death and chronic exposure to Benzene causes various forms of leukemia, especially Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML).

Dr Shezad Malik law firm has expertise in occupational and environmental Benzene exposure litigation.

If you or a loved one have been exposed to Benzene and developed leukemia, you should contact us immediately. You may be entitled to compensation and we can help.

Benzene is a highly flammable colorless liquid, and Benzene occurs naturally in crude oil, gasoline, and a component in many industrial and consumer products.

Benzene is commonly found in: asphalts, charcoal lighter fluid, cigarette lighter fluid, gasoline, glues, kerosene, hydraulic fluids, inks and ink markers, lacquer thinner, rubber cement, solvents, and vinyl thinners among others.

Many industrial workers are at risk for occupational exposure to this carcinogen. These include benzene production (petrochemicals, petroleum refining, and coke/coal chemical manufacturing), tire manufacturing, the printing industry, and storage or transport of benzene and petroleum products containing benzene to name some examples.

Other industrial workers at risk for exposure include those in the rubber industry, pesticides production, solvent production, paint/varnish production, waste management, oil refineries, chemical plants, leather manufacturers, petroleum processing industries, printers, and gas station employees.As you can see from these lists, Benzene is widely used in many industrial processes and frequent occupational exposure can occur.

There have been many instances of Environmental Exposure including Industrial discharge, disposal of products containing benzene, and gasoline leaks from underground storage tanks that have released benzene into our soil and water supplies.

There are Acute (short-term) and Chronic (long-term) side effects to a person being exposed to the chemical. Benzene has been linked to:

* Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML)
* Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma
* Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia
* Myelodysplastic Syndrome (MDS)
* Myelofibrosis and Myeloid Metaplasia
* Aplastic Anemia
* Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia (ALL)
* Hairy Cell Leukemia
* Multiple Myeloma
* Thrombocytopenic Purpura
* Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia (CML)
* Hematologic Cancers

The Dr Shezad Malik law firm focuses on the representation of plaintiffs in Benzene lawsuits. We are handling individual and group litigation nationwide and currently accepting new Benzene cases in all 50 states.

Continue reading "Fort Worth Texas Benzene Lawsuit Attorney" »

We are the Fort Worth Texas Fosamax Product Liability Attorney Dr. Shezad Malik.
The FDA found that in some cases two types of drugs that were supposed to be preventing serious medical problems were, in fact, causing them.

Bisphosphonates like Fosamax, Actonel and Boniva, will now have to carry labels saying they can lead to rare fractures of the thigh bone, a discovery that came after another finding that they can cause a rare degeneration of the jawbone called osteonecrosis.

The other is Avandia, a blockbuster drug which was prescribed for diabetics. Diabetics are at high risk because of the disease process, for heart attacks and heart failure. Now the F.D.A. and drug regulators in Europe are restricting Avandia’s use because it appears to increase heart risks, according to research studies. Talk about a double whammy.

In both cases, the respective drug companies continue to deny any liability to the disease processes associated with the usage of their drugs.

Read Article: The New York Times

Continue reading "When Dangerous Drugs Happen to Good People: Drug Product Liability Attorney" »

As a Dallas Benzene Leukemia Attorney I have followed the news surrounding the oil and gas extraction from the Barnett Shale.

The gas companies are releasing untold amounts of Benzene into the atmosphere and polluting the ground water.

Folks, wake up and smell the roses. We have only one Texas and one World. If you crap this up, we have no where to go. Raise your hands those of you who want to live in a sewer.

Benzene is a volatile hydrocarbon, a product from the Petroleum Industry.

Trouble is, Benzene it is a known carcinogen and very toxic. Many blood cancers occur as a result of exposure to this chemical.

Continue reading "Dallas Benzene Leukemia Attorney" »

The personal injury sage continues. As a Fort Worth Personal Injury attorney I am writing this blog to hopefully provide insight to my readers, about the law works with its byzantine rules and regulations.

The Law and its practical applications are murky at best and we as lawyers have developed our own rituals and our own special language. Because if we spoke in plain English, then it would not be special anymore.

In my last missive I detailed the week before an actual trial that we were getting ready to do on our slip and fall case. The case got continued. Now we are using this opportunity to continue in our siege of the defendants castle. We continue to press our charge and are unrelenting in our skirmishes.

The defendants strategy in every personal injury case, irrespective of the claim, is to first deny the claim, then to deflect the claim ie somebody elses fault and then finally to delay the case going to trial. They hope with this strategy with wear out the plaintiff and make the cost of litigation prohibitively expensive to continue.

This standard strategy is designed to sap the will of the opponent, to make the risk reward ratio tilt in their favor. This tactic may have traction in some quarters especially in the claim is weak or ill founded, but to us it is like waving a red flag to a bull. We are only spurred on, and I have a natural dislike for bullies, and that is what the defense are; bullies by any other name are still bullies, with their repeated denials and rejections of liability and fault.

In this particular instance, we have been at it for over 3 years. The defense is a stubborn lot, mangy and dogged in their delay tactics. We shall prevail, Justice will triumph in the end and the dark forces crushed.

Ultimately the defendants insurance is going to rein them in especially when they have spent more in defending this case than they could have settled it for. They are consumed by over reaching hubris and a lack of common sense. They will ultimately lose this account.

According to OSHA, 4,340 workers died on the job in 2009.

"With every one of these fatalities, the lives of a worker's family members were shattered and forever changed. We can't forget that fact."
-Hilda Solis, Secretary of Labor

Poorly Managed Construction Sites Are Dangerous.

Construction site injuries include:

* Falls
* Struck by falling object
* Struck by laterally moving object or equipment
* Impalement or penetrating injury
* Truck or other motor vehicle accident
* Electrocution
* Explosions
* Burns

Continue reading "Dallas Fort Worth Construction Sites Can Lead to Brain and Spinal Cord Injuries" »

I am proud of our work this week. We just settled another car accident injury claim. My client was minding his own business, one night in Dallas. Somebody plowed into him and rear ended him. The folks who hit him were drunk and tried to run. They were caught by an off duty apartment security guard.

Come to find out they were high as a kite and ready to fly.

Luckily for my client he had minor soft tissue injuries, but he had pre-existing neck problems including cervical neck fusion. Obviously we were concerned that he may have had neck injuries. But after medical evaluation he was cleared of major injuries.

We settled for insurance policy limits.

When you need to help after an injury or accident, you need to find the Dallas Fort Worth Texas personal injury lawyers.

We evaluate and accept cases all over Texas including Houston, Dallas, San Antonio car accidents, auto wrongful death cases, mesothelioma, burn injuries, Accutane side effect bowel disease, Paxil birth defects, brain injuries, 18 wheeler, semi truck, tractor trailer accidents, diesel truck or big rig accidents.

If you have been injured in an accident as a result of the negligence of others,
please call 817-900-8439, 888-210-9693 or Contact Me Online.

In a column in the Washington Post (8/6), Petula Dvorak writes, "Over their fences, at community picnics but mostly at funerals, the people of one Frederick neighborhood near Fort Detrick wondered whether it was just a horrible coincidence that so many of them had cancer."

They "immediately looked to their former next-door neighbor, Fort Detrick, where anthrax and Agent Orange were studied for decades and where about 400 acres known as Area B were used for storage and dumping."

Scientists "determined that vapors rising through the ground from the discarded chemicals had seeped into the" home of Randy White. White "is considering a class-action lawsuit against the Army."

Continue reading "Residents Suspect Cancer Cluster Near Fort Detrick, MD." »

A lawsuit in south Texas has been filed against British Petroleum over pollutants leaking out of the company's Texas City refinery.

The lawsuit claims more than 500,000 pounds of pollutants were released into the air when one of the compressors went offline in April.

The citizens of Texas City experienced "sinus and eye issues, coughing, feeling nauseous, and feeling lethargic," from exposure to benzene, one of the chemicals released, the suit claims. The lawsuit seeks $10 billion in damages.

T.J. Aulds, Galveston County - The Daily News 08/04/2010
Read Article: Galveston County - The Daily News

Continue reading "Lawsuit Filed Over Pollutants From TX City Refinery" »

A Friendswood attorney filed a federal lawsuit over the release of more than 500,000 pounds of pollutants — including high levels of benzene — into the air after a unit failure at BP’s Texas City refinery.

The lawsuit seeks monetary damages in the release of pollutants between April 6 and May 16, when the refinery’s ultracracker’s hydrogen compressor went offline.

BP doesn’t argue the fact that more than 250 tons of emissions were sent into the atmosphere during the 40 days. The company does take issue with claims the health of workers and residents was affected. T.J. Aulds, Galveston County - The Daily News 08/05/2010

Read Article: Galveston County - The Daily News

A group of former Motorola workers and their children filed a lawsuit Friday against the Schaumburg-based company, claiming toxic substances used to make Motorola products caused serious birth defects in at least 30 children born to workers employed by the company since the 1960s.

The 71 plaintiffs filed the suit in Cook County Circuit Court. The suit claims Motorola knew the chemicals used to make semiconductors and computer chips in sterile "clean rooms" were toxic and had the potential to cause birth defects in children born to people exposed to the compounds.

Thirty children of former employees allegedly suffer from physical and developmental disabilities, including cerebral palsy, autism, spina bifida, sterility and brain malformations, the suit claims. LEEANN MATON, Chicago Sun-Times 07/26/2010

Read Article: Chicago Sun-Times

Continue reading "Ex-Workers' Lawsuit Blames Motorola for Birth Defects" »

Patients undergoing arthroscopic shoulder surgery have received pain pumps to assist in their recovery. Now a new study suggests these pumps may deliver too much medicine, destroying cartilage and leading to a condition known as Postarthroscopic Glenohumeral Chondrolysis.

A study by The American Journal of Sports Medicine identified intra-articular pain pumps as the likely cause of Postarthroscopic Glenohumeral Chondrolysis (PAGCL).

PAGCL only occurs in patients who received a shoulder pain pump filled with bupivacaine and epinephrine during their surgery.

Numerous lawsuits are pending against the companies that manufacture, market or distribute the pain pumps, including Stryker, DJO Inc., I-Flow Inc., BREG Inc. and others.

Continue reading "Dallas Texas Update: Pain Pumps & Arthoscopic Shoulder Surgery Risks" »

A Texas natural gas producer's decision to voluntarily disclose the chemicals it injects into the ground could prompt other drillers to do the same, and pave the way for regulators to require such disclosure.

But Range Resources Corp.'s move also reflects the desire of industry to get out ahead of the issue to prevent federal regulation of the key drilling practice called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. MIKE SORAGHAN, Greenwire, The New York Times 07/16/2010

Read Article: The New York Times

Continue reading "Natural Gas Company's Natural Gas Disclosure Decision Could Change Fracking " »

TXI will permanently shut down its four oldest, highest-polluting cement kilns in Midlothian and will stop burning hazardous waste as fuel, the company said Tuesday.

The Dallas-based company’s announcement ends an environmental battle that has raged in North Texas for decades.

Midlothian became a center for the cement industry because of extensive limestone deposits. Yet it also became the site of one of the country’s biggest environmental fights.

Federal law allows some cement kilns to burn hazardous waste as fuel to create the high heat required to make cement. TXI is the only company that has burned hazardous waste in Midlothian in recent years.

Environmentalists across the country and in North Texas said burning massive volumes of chemical waste needlessly endangered the public.

Read the full story here at the Dallas Morning News.

Continue reading "TXI to Shut Down Highest-Polluting Cement Kilns in Midlothian Texas" »

Two Texas natural gas pipelines that exploded last month, killing three people, had not been properly marked, according to state records.

Incident reports filed with the commission by the pipeline operators and excavators involved in each event confirm that neither pipeline was properly marked before the digging.

State law requires that companies wanting to excavate call a national 811 number to state where they plan to dig and request information about pipelines and anything else underground that might be struck. AMAN BATHEJA, Fort Worth Star-Telegram 07/02/2010

Read Article: Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Continue reading "Pipelines in Texas Natural Gas Explosions Were Not Properly Marked " »

While most of the discussions about the environmental impact of natural gas drilling in the Barnett Shale have centered on air quality, questions are now being raised about its potential impact on water quality as well.

Drilling critics have expressed concern that a drilling process called hydraulic fracturing in which millions of gallons of water and sand laced with chemicals are pumped into the ground to free up natural gas -- has the potential to contaminate groundwater supplies. ELIZABETH CAMPBELL and AMAN BATHEJA, Fort Worth Star-Telegram 07/02/2010

Read Article: Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Continue reading "Residents Blame Drilling Process for Fouled Well Water" »

San Francisco Chronicle (6/23, Zito) reports, "The thousands of mine shafts that pockmark the Sierra Nevada and testify to California's Gold Rush riches have also left a legacy of toxic contamination in some of the state's popular recreation areas, according to a new study.

Soil tests on a handful of trails near mine mouths in the foothills have revealed extremely high levels of lead, arsenic and asbestos, said researchers at the Sierra Fund, a small environmental advocacy group." Elizabeth Martin, chief executive of the group, said, "This is the longest neglected environmental problem in California."

Read the full story here.

Continue reading "Sierra Nevada Trails Contaminated With Lead, Arsenic, Asbestos." »

In the first frantic days after the blowout of the oil well in the Gulf of Mexico, crisis managers in Houston, concerned about the potential for an even greater catastrophe, weighed the risks of using more aggressive methods to try to control the well or leaving it alone, according to meeting notes and other documents.

A handwritten log was among hundreds of pages of unreleased documents obtained by The New York Times in which managers describe the desperate bid to control the subsea gusher that has spewed millions of gallons of oil into the gulf. Henry Fountain, The New York Times 06/22/2010

Read Article: The New York Times

Continue reading "BP Oil Spill Blowout Documents" »

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality is investigating a company that installed a gas pipeline through the site of an old landfill in northeast Fort Worth without proper permission.

Houston-based Enterprise Products Partners is installing a 30-inch pipeline that runs from just north of Arlington to a network of interstate pipelines near Justin. The line, designed to transport natural gas produced from drill sites in the Barnett Shale, is expected to start operating in the third quarter of this year.

The site was listed as a former unauthorized landfill on a database maintained by the North Central Texas Council of Governments. Companies are supposed to check the database before installing a pipeline in the region, according to officials. AMAN BATHEJA, Fort Worth Star-Telegram 06/24/2010

Read Article: Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Continue reading "Texas Company Being Investigated By TCEQ Over Gas Pipeline" »

The AP (6/18) reports officials investigating a string of birth defects in rural Kettleman City, CA, "started taking samples of the air, water and soil" while "grieving parents" testified before state legislators about "infant deaths and birth defects in an impoverished farm town next to the biggest hazardous waste landfill in the West."

Residents blame "toxic waste dump for the grouping of cleft palates and heart problems," but Waste Management officials "have said there is no evidence linking the...landfill to the deformities."

The company received approval to expand the 1,600-acre facility despite opposition from the residents. The expansion is pending results of state and federal environmental investigations.

Read full New York Times story here.

Continue reading "Officials Begin Testing Kettleman City California Hazardous Waste Landfill." »

McDonald's has recalled 12 million of its Shrek-themed glasses sold in the last month due to the toxic chemical cadmium found on the glasses' design.

Long-term exposure to cadmium can lead to adverse health affects, and consumers who have purchased any of the glasses are urged to stop using them immediately.

A refund can be obtained by visiting McDonald's Web site. Alissa Figueroa, Christian Science Monitor 06/04/2010

Read Article: Christian Science Monitor

Continue reading " McDonald's Recalls Shrek Glasses Over Toxic Chemical Cadmium" »

Bloomberg News (6/3, Fisk, Calkins) reports, "The US government asked a federal judge to reject Transocean Ltd.'s bid to use a 159-year-old law to cap its liability at $27 million for environmental claims tied to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

The Justice Department announced an investigation of whether any criminal or civil laws were violated in the BP Plc oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, the biggest US spill on record. The government is reviewing whether there were violations of the Clean Water Act and the Oil Pollution Act of 1990."

The US filed the motion in Houston federal court to 'make clear' it's entitled to pursue claims 'for pollution response costs, environmental damages and other injuries stemming from the oil spill,' Assistant US Attorney General Tony West wrote.

'It is simply unconscionable, in the circumstances of this case, that Transocean is attempting to use this' law to avoid paying states or the US for damages caused by the rig explosion, West said in a May 24 letter to Transocean's lawyers."

Read full Bloomberg article here.

Continue reading "US asks judge to reject Transocean liability cap." »

A Miami judge approved a lawsuit for class-action status over the issue of tainted drywall imported from China.

The lawsuit will represent 152 families and was filed against homebuilder South Kendall Construction Corp., Palm Isles Holdings, Keys Gate Realty and Banner Supply.

The lawsuit alleges that some of the drywall installed in Florida homes releases large amounts of hydrogen sulfide, which corrodes metal.

The suit also claims the contaminated drywall causes breathing problems and nosebleeds. Nirvi Shah, Miami Herald 05/28/2010
Read Article: Miami Herald

In another setback in the effort to stem the flow of oil gushing from a well a mile beneath the Gulf of Mexico, BP engineers said that the “top kill” technique had failed and they had decided to move on to another strategy.

The abandonment of the top kill technique, was the latest in a series of failures. First, BP failed in efforts to repair a blowout preventer with submarine robots. Then its initial efforts to cap the well with a containment dome failed when it became clogged with a frothy mix of frigid water and gas.

BP has started work on two relief wells, but officials have said that they will not be completed until August — further contributing to what is already the worst oil spill in United States history.

Read the full story here at the New York Times.

Continue reading "Dallas Oil Recovery Team: BP Leak ‘Top Kill’ Fails" »

Plaintiff Andrew McCarrell was awarded $25.16 M in damages in his lawsuit against Roche Holding AG, maker of Accutane. McCarrell alleged in his lawsuit that his use of Accutane resulted in inflammatory bowel disease. McCarrell underwent five surgeries, including one to remove his colon.

According to Bloomberg on 2/16/10, McCarrell initially was awarded $2.62 M in his lawsuit, but that award was overturned and a new trial was ordered.

Accutane was introduced to the market in 1982 with a list of serious side effects including birth defects and depression. More than 13 million people reportedly used Accutane before Roche removed it from the market in June 2009, citing the cost of personal injury lawsuits.

May 22, 2010. By Heidi Turner Read full story here Lawyers and Settlements

Continue reading "Dallas Texas Accutane Lawsuit Update" »

Health workers tracking Libby's plight estimate at least 400 people have died of asbestos-related illnesses — from W.R. Grace mine workers and family members who breathed in the dust they brought home in their clothes, to those who played as kids in waste piles dumped by the company behind the community baseball field.

Some 1,500 locals and others who were exposed have chest X-rays revealing the faint, cloudy shadows of asbestos scarring on their lungs. Even though research long showed cause for concern — up to 70 percent of miners in a 1980s study had fibers in their lungs — it took news reports about the deaths to drive officials to action, beginning a decade ago.

After the cleanup began, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency confidently predicted it would be done in two years at a cost of $5.8 million. Ten years on, the price tag has exceeded $333 million, the deaths continue, and more asbestos keeps showing up — in schools, in businesses, in hundreds of houses.

The scope of contamination has at times overwhelmed environmental regulators, dragging out the cleanup, an Associated Press review of hundreds of pages of government documents and interviews with current and former agency officials revealed.

Matthew Brown, Associated Press, Yahoo News 05/25/2010

Continue reading "For Asbestos-Ravaged Town, Questions Persist" »

Actor Dennis Quaid has filed a lawsuit against drug maker Baxter Healthcare Corp. over two easily confused drugs that, when mixed up, almost killed his twin infants.

The lawsuit claims that the blood thinner Heparin and a less potent drug, Hep-lock, have such similar labels that the two are easily confused. In late 2007, Quaid's twins were given an almost fatal dose of Heparin instead of Hep-lock at a local hospital. The lawsuit also states that the company should have recalled the Heparin because they knew that similar incidents had occurred before.

Staff and Wire Reports, Contra Costa Times 05/25/2010
Read Article: Contra Costa Times

Continue reading " Actor Dennis Quaid Files Suit Over Heparin Drug Mix Up" »

The federal agency responsible for regulating offshore oil drilling repeatedly ignored warnings from government scientists about environmental risks in its push to approve energy exploration activities quickly, according to numerous documents and interviews.

Minerals Management Service officials, who receive cash bonuses for meeting federal deadlines on leasing offshore oil and gas exploration, frequently altered their own documents and bypassed legal requirements aimed at ensuring drilling does not imperil the marine environment, the documents show. Juliet Eilperin, The Washington Post 05/24/2010

Read Article: The Washington Post

http://www.shezadmalik.com/lawyer-attorney-1459578.html

Continue reading "Federal Agency Overseeing Oil Drilling Ignored Warnings of Risks" »

The U.S. government is ordering energy giant BP to find less-toxic chemicals to break up the Gulf of Mexico oil spill amid evidence that the dispersants are not effective and could actually make the spill more harmful to marine life.

The Environmental Protection Agency said that BP has to choose an alternative dispersant and must begin using it. So far, BP has put about 600,000 gallons of the chemical mixture Corexit 9500 on the surface and 55,000 gallons on the sea bottom.

Dispersants are toxic, and when mixed with oil can become even more dangerous than either the dispersant or oil alone, according to EPA data.

Oil treated with dispersants spreads through the water, more readily coming in contact with delicate fish eggs and other fragile sea dwellers, said Peter Hodson, a specialist in fish toxicology who is director of the School of Environmental Studies at Queen's University in Kingston, Canada.

Read the full story here at USA Today.

The decision by BP and federal officials to use the chemical dispersant Corexit to break up oil spewing in the Gulf of Mexico is drawing fire from congress who say there are more powerful, less toxic dispersants that could be used to combat the crude.

Environmentalists have raised warnings about the risk that dispersants can be stored indefinitely in the organs and tissues of marine animals.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has acknowledged the threat in describing the use of dispersants as a trade- off between the harm of allowing oil to accumulate and the possible damage to marine life from the detergent-like substance.

Because there is uncertainty about “the long-term effects on aquatic life,” Jackson said, “we must make sure that the dispersants … are as nontoxic as possible.”

The lawmakers suggested that corporate ties between BP and the manufacturer drove the choice. JENNIFER A. DLOUHY, Houston Chronicle 05/20/2010
Read Article: Houston Chronicle

Several prominent oceanographers are claiming that the government is failing to conduct an adequate scientific analysis of the damage and allowing BP to block the spill’s true size and scope.

The scientists point out that in the month since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded, the government has failed to make public a single test result on water from the deep ocean.

And the scientists say the administration has been too reluctant to demand an accurate analysis of how many gallons of oil are flowing into the sea from the gushing oil well.

Read the full story here at the New York Times

Continue reading "U.S. Lack of Response in Assessing BP Gulf Oil Spill" »

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration greatly expanded the fishing ban in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday in response to spreading oil from the BP well blowout. The prohibited area now covers 19 percent of the gulf, nearly double what it was, according to the agency.

In Washington, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar appeared before Congress for the first time since the well exploded a month ago. Mr. Salazar acknowledged that the Minerals Management Service, the Interior Department agency responsible for policing offshore drilling, had been weakened by corruption and lax enforcement of safety and environmental rules.

Read the full New York Times story here.

Tonight's 60 minutes show on CBS, reported the harrowing story of the BP TransOcean's rig, the Deep Horizon.

As the world knows on April 20, 2010 there was a tremendous explosion on the oil rig, located some 40 miles of the Louisiana coast. In the gas explosion 11 oil rig workers lost there lives in the ensuing fire ball.

Watch the 60 Minutes segment here.

Continue reading "Devastating BP Oil Rig Explosion Survivor Tells Story on 60 Minutes" »

Scientists are finding enormous oil plumes in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, including one as large as 10 miles long, 3 miles wide and 300 feet thick in spots. The discovery is evidence that the leak from the broken undersea well is worse than estimates that the government and BP have given.

The plumes are depleting the oxygen dissolved in the gulf, worrying scientists, who fear that the oxygen level could eventually fall so low as to kill off much of the sea life near the plumes.

Read the full story here at the New York Times.

A Houston judge agreed Thursday to stay pending cases against Transocean arising from the April 20 disaster that destroyed its Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, killed 11 workers and created a growing oil spill.

U.S. District Judge Keith Ellison issued an order suspending the cases against Transocean at the company's request after it sought a $26.7 million limit to its liability in the lawsuits.

Lawyers involved in the myriad lawsuits filed against Transocean, rig leaser BP and others said they had expected Transocean would attempt such a move under the Limitation of Liability Act, a maritime law that allows vessel owners to limit liability to the value of a vessel and its freight. Mary Flood, Houston Chronicle 05/14/2010

Read Article: Houston Chronicle

A man who claimed that he developed severe bowel problems from Accutane, an acne medication, has reached a pre-trial settlement with Roche Laboratories, the drug’s manufacturer.

Roche has asked Madison County Circuit Judge to approve the Accutane settlement, according to a report in The Madison Record.

The plaintiff, Peipert alleges that Dr. Daniel Goran prescribed him Accutane to treat his acne, and that the drug caused him to develop the debilitating condition, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). The case was set to go to trial on April 19, but start of the trial was delayed due the potential settlement with Accutane manufacturers.

Continue reading "Accutane Lawsuit Settled on eve of Trial" »

Scientists and environmental groups are raising questions about 5,000 gallons per day estimate. They also criticize BP for refusing to use scientific techniques that would give a more precise figure.

BP has repeatedly claimed that measuring the plume of oil gushing from the broken well would be impossible.

The issue of how fast the well is leaking has been unclear from the beginning. For several days after the April 21 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon rig, the government and BP claimed that the well on the ocean floor was leaking about 1,000 barrels a day.

Read the full New York Times story here.

An Oklahoma City jury has ordered Allergan Inc., the maker of Botox Cosmetic, to pay $15 million to a local doctor who claimed she suffered botulism poisoning from the product.

Dr. Sharla Helton claimed in her lawsuit that the illness she suffered as a result of Botox injections in 2006 caused her to quit her job. The jury said they ruled against Allergan Inc. because their Botox product did not have adequate information about side affects on its warning label. Nolan Clay, NewsOK.com 05/12/2010

Read Article: NewsOK.com

Continue reading "OK Jury Finds Botox Maker Negligent, Awards $15 M" »

After BP’s Texas City, Tex., refinery blew up in 2005, killing 15 workers, the company promised to fix the safety issues that caused the blast.

In 2006 a oil pipeline ruptured and spilled 200,000 gallons of crude oil over Alaska’s North Slope, the oil giant once again vowed to fix the problems.

In 2007, BP settled a series of criminal charges, including Texas City, and agreed to pay $370 million in fines.

Read the full story at the New York Times.

Continue reading "BP's Poor Record: History of Spills and Safety Lapses" »

The effort to contain the oil spill that has poured millions of gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico encountered a setback, according to officials. This means that oil will continue gushing into the ocean for possibly months.

Workers earlier maneuvered a containment dome over the remaining leaks on the seabed to funnel the oil to the surface, where it would be collected by a drill ship.

Read the full story here at the New York Times.

Continue reading "Attempt to Contain Gulf Oil Spill Plagued With Problems" »

In the worst case, the disaster could grow at 12 times the rate of current estimates, BP officials say at a Capitol Hill briefing.

BP officials told congressional representatives that the Gulf of Mexico oil spill could grow at a rate more than 10 times current estimates in a worst-case scenario — greatly enlarging the potential scope of the disaster.

Most of the handful of congressional Democrats and Republicans who met with representatives from BP, Transocean Ltd. and Halliburton in a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill walked away unimpressed.

Read full LA Times story here.

Continue reading "BP Gives Gloomy Outlook on Gulf Oil Spill" »

With each day that the leaking oil well a mile below the surface remains uncapped, scientists and energy industry observers are imagining outcomes that range from bad to worse to worst, with some forecasting a calamity of historic proportions.

Executives from oil giant BP and other energy companies, meanwhile, shared their own worst-case scenario in a Capitol Hill meeting with lawmakers, saying that if they fail to close the well, the spill could increase from an estimated 5,000 barrels a day to 40,000 barrels.

Read the full Washington Post Story here.

Continue reading "After Gulf Coast Oil Spill, Devastation Predicted For Region" »

Where the world runs out of road and into bayou, and all that is left beyond is the Gulf of Mexico, dozens of docked shrimp boats bob in place. They should be out right now, green nets trawling for cash in crustaceans.

Among these many boats — actually, between the Capt. Andy and the Capt. James — there rocks the St. Martin. And on the St. Martin, there lives its owner, a Vietnamese-born American named Thuong Nguyen, whose right forearm bears a tattoo that says, in his native language:

“Life is difficult.”

Read the full New York Times story here.

Continue reading "At the End of the Road Hwy 23: Dallas Oil Recovery Team" »

The government ordered a halt on Sunday to fishing in areas affected by the ever-spreading oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico, a ban that covers waters from Louisiana to Florida and hinders the livelihoods of untold numbers of fishermen.

Citing public safety concerns, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration restricted fishing for at least 10 days in the affected waters, largely between Louisiana state waters at the mouth of the Mississippi River to waters off Pensacola Bay in Florida. Scientists were taking samples of water and seafood to ensure food safety.

Read the full New York Times story here.

Continue reading "Safety Fears Halt Fishing in Areas Affected by Spill" »

BP's chief executive is coming under mounting pressure over the vast spill spreading in the Gulf of Mexico, which was caused when a giant drilling rig there caught fire and sank, with the loss of 11 crew members. The oil, still spewing from the well on the ocean floor, threatens to blacken the Louisana shoreline, and BP's reputation.

When Mr. Hayward took over BP's leadership three years ago, the company was badly run, accident-prone and accused in the aftermath of a deadly explosion at its Texas City refinery of putting profits before safety.

None of that seems to matter now, as BP heads into the crisis grinder. And with about 5,000 barrels of oil leaking from the damaged well each day.

Read the full WSJ story here.

Continue reading "BP's Worsening Spill Crisis" »

The world’s most endangered species of sea turtle is threatened by an oil slick that’s expanding in the Gulf of Mexico as 5,000 barrels a day of fuel gushes from a BP Plc well.

The Kemp’s Ridley turtle only nests in the western Gulf of Mexico, with one of its main feeding grounds in the area of the oil spill, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website. The species is critically endangered, the highest degree of threat on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s “Red List.”

“Oil cannot be good for these animals because it’s toxic and can kill them,” Andre Landry, a marine biologist who runs the Sea Turtle and Fisheries Ecology Research Lab at Texas A&M University at Galveston. Oil nearing shore waters “will affect Kemp’s Ridleys from juveniles through to adults as well as their food and habitats.”

Read the full Bloomberg story here.

Continue reading "World’s Most Endangered Sea Turtle Threatened by BP Oil Slick" »

Oil gushed into the Gulf of Mexico unabated Saturday, and officials conveyed little hope that the flow could be contained soon, forcing towns along the Gulf Coast to brace for what is increasingly understood to be an imminent environmental disaster.

The spill, emanating from a pipe 50 miles offshore and 5,000 feet underwater, was creeping into Louisiana’s fragile coastal wetlands as strong winds and rough waters hampered cleanup efforts. Officials said the oil could hit the shores of Mississippi and Alabama as soon as Monday.

The White House announced that President Obama would visit the region on Sunday morning.

Read the full New York Times story here.

Continue reading "Gulf Coast Towns Brace as Huge Oil Slick Nears Marshes: Dallas Texas Oil Spill Recovery Team-Update 4" »

An oil spill that threatened to eclipse even the Exxon Valdez disaster spread out of control and started washing ashore along the Gulf Coast as fishermen rushed to scoop up shrimp and crews spread floating barriers around marshes.

The spill was bigger than imagined — five times more than first estimated — and closer. Fingers of oily sheen were reaching the Mississippi River delta, lapping the Louisiana shoreline in long, thin lines.

Read the full story here.

Continue reading "'Mind-boggling' oil spill in Gulf could eclipse Exxon Valdez disaster: Dallas Texas Oil Spill Recovery Team-Update 3" »

Teams of lawyers from around the nation are mobilizing for legal battles over the massive Gulf Coast oil spill, filing at least 26 potential class action lawsuits.

Attorneys say there could be hundreds of thousands of plaintiffs from Texas to Florida seeking damages. Plaintiffs so far include commercial fishermen, charter boat captains, resort management companies and individual property owners.

Plaintiffs in class-action cases seek to represent an entire group of people in similar situations who claim economic losses due to company negligence.

The lawsuits target BP PLC, Transocean and other companies involved in the offshore rig that exploded in the Gulf and began leaking oil.

Read the full AP story here.

Continue reading "Lawyers Flock to Gulf Coast For Oil Spill Lawsuits: Dallas Texas Oil Spill Recovery Team-Update 2" »

Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, who directed relief efforts in the gulf after Katrina, says that it’s impossible to estimate the size of the oil slick and that his priority is on stopping its spread.

The new top commander heading the fight against a massive oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico said on Saturday that it was impossible to estimate the size of the leak pouring into the water.

Allen's comments come as academics and consultants say the size of the leak is growing and is perhaps three times larger than previously thought. The amount of oil leaked may already be about 10 million gallons and growing. By comparison, the Exxon Valdez spill was about 11 million gallons.

Read the full story here at the Los Angeles Times

Continue reading "Dallas Oil Spill Recovery Team: New Federal Commander Fights Against BP Oil Leaks" »

As a personal injury attorney, medical doctor and concerned environmentalist I have decided to team up with my very good friend, Spencer Aronfeld of the Aronfeld Law Firm. Today we are going to the Gulf Coast to assess for ourselves first hand the impact of this environmental catastrophe.

What will follow over the next few days will be dispatches from the front lines; first hand cataloging of the damage. We are hopeful that with pictures and video of the devastating damage we can start a discussion and have people think about the downside of oil.

Continue reading "Dallas Texas Oil Spill Recovery Team-Update 1" »

Driven deep into Gulf Coast waterways by wind and seasonally high tides, the spreading oil slick from the Deepwater Horizon accident could cause serious ecological and wildlife-health consequences long after signs of surface damage have been erased.

Independent studies of several major oil spills, including the 1989 Exxon Valdez accident, show that oil often reaches farther into tidal estuaries than previously thought and can soak into shoreline sediment where it can continue to affect fish and wildlife for 10 or 20 years.

In the aftermath of offshore oil spills in Alaska, Massachusetts and Spain, researchers discovered long-term effects on shellfish, crabs, seabirds, whales and sea otters years after the accidents. The problems ranged from altered blood chemistry and higher levels of stress hormones to erratic behavior, contaminated eggs and long-term population declines.

Read the full story here at the Wall Street Journal

Continue reading "Threats to Wildlife Often Linger Long After Accidents " »

Frank Campo thinks the oil spill approaching the marshes east of New Orleans may destroy his community.

Campo, who runs Campo’s Marina in St. Bernard Parish’s Shell Beach, says the response to the spill is too little and too late to prevent economic disaster for the commercial and recreational fishermen who earn a living from the coast.

Read the full Bloomberg story here.

Continue reading "Oil Spill’s ‘Fisheries Failure’ May Signal End of Coastal Towns " »

We blogged on Thursday about the initial lawsuits getting filed over the huge oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Those suits, however, are likely to turn out to represent just the tip of the iceberg in regard to the legal trouble likely facing a host of defendants, including BP, Transocean Offshore Deepwater Drilling, and others.

Read the full WSJ story here.

Continue reading "Guessing the Feds’ Response to the BP Oil Rig Explosion" »

As oil edged toward the Louisiana coast, fears continued to grow that the leak from the seabed oil well could spiral out of control. One official at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said the oil flow could grow from the current estimate of 5,000 barrels a day to “an order of magnitude higher than that.”

BP officials said they did everything possible, and a review of the response suggests it may be too simplistic to place all the blame on the oil company. The federal government also had opportunities to move more quickly, but did not do so while it waited for a resolution to the spreading spill from BP, which was leasing the drilling rig that exploded in flames on April 20 and sank two days later. Eleven workers are missing and presumed dead.

Read the full New York Times.

Continue reading "BP Is Criticized Over Toxic Oil Spill" »

BP PLC said Friday that it would honor all "legitimate claims" for damages stemming from the Louisiana oil spill, as the company's stock continued to fall amid investors' concerns about potential litigation and a total clean-up bill that could run well into the billions of dollars.

The disaster was set in motion when the Deepwater Horizon, which had been leased by BP to drill a well in the Gulf of Mexico, caught fire and sank, killing 11 crew members. BP's efforts to stop the flow of oil from the well have failed.

The company is spending about $6 million a day on the clean-up, but those costs are expected to escalate with the oil making landfall. Analyst estimates of BP's total costs stemming from the disaster range from around $2.5 billion to $8 billion. BP says it is self-insured.

Read the full Wall Street Article Here.

Continue reading "BP's Escalating Costs Put Investors on Edge " »

British Petroleum downplayed the possibility of a catastrophic accident at an offshore rig that exploded, causing the worst U.S. oil spill in decades along the Gulf Coast and endangering shoreline habitat.

In its 2009 exploration plan and environmental impact analysis for the well, BP suggested it was unlikely, or virtually impossible, for an accident to occur that would lead to a giant crude oil spill and serious damage to beaches, fish and mammals.

At least 1.6 million gallons of oil have spilled so far since the April 20 explosion that killed 11 workers, according to Coast Guard estimates.

Read the full AP story here.

Continue reading "BP Document: No Plan For Major Oil Spill" »

It’s looking much more likely that the oil spill from a BP well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico will have political ramifications in the U.S.

The situation in the Gulf deteriorated again as the U.S. Coastguard revealed that oil is gushing from the damaged well five times faster than previously thought. A change in prevailing winds means the growing oil slick is likely to reach land on Friday, despite BP’s massive efforts to contain it.

Read the full Wall St Story here.

Continue reading "Political Consequences Loom As Gulf Oil Slick Spreads Faster" »

The plaintiff' attorneys are starting to circle the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Attorneys have filed a class action on Thursday over damages caused by the drilling rig that exploded on April 20.

The suit, Cooper v. BP plc, was filed in the Eastern District of Louisiana on behalf of Louisiana shrimpers, fisherman and commercial boaters who claim the oil spill is hurting their livelihood.

Read the full story here at the National Law Journal.

Continue reading "Class Action Lawsuits Filed Over Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill " »

Two new federal lawsuits are filed over the oil spill that is currently spewing crude into the Gulf of Mexico after an explosion on one of BP PLC’s offshore rigs. Both lawsuits were filed in the Eastern District of Louisiana.

The first was filed on behalf of two Louisiana commercial shrimpers Acy J. Cooper and Ronnie Louis Anderson, who allege that the spill “is causing dangerous environmental contamination of the Gulf of Mexico and its shorelines, threatening Louisiana’s sensitive wetlands and estuarine areas” and it “will continue to cause loss of revenue to persons (and businesses) who are being prevented from using the Gulf of Mexico and Louisiana’s Coastal Zone for diverse activities, including work and to earn a living.”

Read the full WSJ story here.

Continue reading "Gulf Oil Spill Law Suits Start " »

A Mississippi jury has awarded $15 million to a 71 year-old oil industry worker who developed asbestosis after years of handling bags of product containing 99 percent asbestos.

Plaintiff Troy Lofton, who testified at trial with tubes in his nose and ears and holding an oxygen bottle that assists his breathing 24 hours a day, alleged that ConocoPhillips manufactured a dangerous product while knowing of its dangers.

The case is only the third to go to trial of over 700 pending cases involving oilfield workers who developed lung cancer, asbestosis or mesothelioma after handling products made by ConocoPhillips or its subsidiaries.

Among the evidence at trial was a handwritten document indicating that the company had weighed the cost of personal injury lawsuits against the profits of continuing to sell asbestos.

Read full story here.

Continue reading "Jury Awards $15M Asbestos Verdict : Dallas Texas Mesothelioma Attorney" »

Tests on blood and urine samples taken from residents by state health officials in January have found the same toxic compounds in people's bodies that have been detected in the air and water here.

The results showed that exposure is occurring, according to Louisiana chemist Wilma Subra.

"Clearly, it's connecting the dots – which we didn't want to happen," Subra said.

Read full story here.

Continue reading "Tests Detect Barnett Shale Emissions Toxins in Dish Residents" »

Plumes of toxic, smog-causing chemicals from Barnett Shale natural-gas operations are so common that inspectors find them nearly every time they look, a Dallas Morning News examination of government records shows.

What's more, the inspectors have rarely looked.

Hundreds of pages of documents obtained by The News under federal and state open-records laws, plus other reports and studies, reveal a pattern of emissions of toxic compounds, often including cancer-causing benzene, from Barnett Shale facilities.

Read the full story here.

Continue reading "Dallas Texas Barnett Shale Facilities Release Toxic Emissions" »

For 14 years until just last month, GlaxoSmithKline sold a denture cream called Super Poligrip that contained high levels of zinc.

The zinc helped with adhesion and was probably safe so long as people used moderate amounts of cream. Indeed, the human body needs small amounts of zinc to function. But some people ended up using much larger amounts, and they began to develop the kind of nerve damage associated with excess zinc.

Read the full New York Times story here.

Continue reading "Poligrip and Fixodent Litigation Update" »

For what appears to be the first time, a former resident of Camp Lejeune, N.C., has been permitted to move ahead with a claim against the Marine Corps for years of water contamination that she says led to the development of her non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

The U.S. Department of the Navy, which includes the Marines, this week lost its bid to dismiss the case of Laura J. Jones of Iowa, who lived at Camp Lejeune from 1980 to 1983 as the spouse of a Marine officer.

In 2005, more than two decades after she left North Carolina, Jones was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Continue reading "Judge: Lejeune Resident Can Move Ahead With Injury Claim" »

The maker of Poligrip denture cream will stop making formulas containing zinc amid lawsuits claiming years of excessive use caused neurological damage and blood problems in consumers, allegedly crippling some.

GlaxoSmithKline will stop making and marketing Super Poligrip Original, Ultra Fresh and Extra Care products in the U.S. The company plans to reformulate the creams without zinc.

Read the full story at the New York Times

Continue reading "Glaxo to Remove Zinc From Denture Cream" »

A range of health problems are linked to the pits on military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan. Toxic substances have been found in the smoke.

The noxious smoke plumes that wafted over the military base in Balad, Iraq, alarmed Lt. Col. Michelle Franco. The stench from a huge burn pit clung to her clothing, skin and hair.

She wheezed and coughed constantly. When Franco returned to the U.S., she was diagnosed with reactive airway dysfunction syndrome. She is no longer able to serve as an Air Force nurse.

Read full story here at the Los Angeles Times

Continue reading " US Army Veterans Blame Burn Pits For Toxic Injury" »

Roche Holding AG, the Swiss drugmaker, must pay $25.16 million in damages to a former user of its Accutane drug who blamed the acne medicine for his inflammatory bowel disease, a New Jersey jury ruled.

Andrew McCarrell, 38, won the verdict at a retrial in Atlantic City, New Jersey. An appeals court ordered the new trial after overturning a $2.62 million award he won in May 2007. McCarrell, a computer technician from Birmingham, Alabama, testified he got sick after taking the drug for acne in 1995. He needed five surgeries, including one to remove his colon.

Read the full Reuter story here.

Continue reading "" »

The family of Kristen Spears alleges an overdose of the drug manufactured by Irvine-based Allergan Inc. killed her at age 7.

Spears started getting Botox injections at the age of 6 -- not to smooth furrows in her brow, but to calm spasms in her legs.

The girl was born with severe cerebral palsy, and Botox, best known as a face-lift-in-a-syringe, can relax contorted muscles and sometimes help young patients walk without surgery.

Read full story here.

Continue reading "Allergan Trial Will Focus on Botox's Safety in Cerebral Palsy Treatments" »

A Rhode Island meat company recalled 1.24 million pounds of pepper-coated salami, after officials conducting a months-long, multistate investigation of a salmonella outbreak compared shopping receipts of those who got sick.

The recall by Daniele International Inc. comes amid an outbreak that's sickened 184 people in 38 states since July.

Daniele has been identified as the source of the ongoing outbreak by William Keene, a senior epidemiologist at the public health division in Oregon, where eight people have gotten sick.

Continue reading "RI Meat Company Recalling 1.2M Pounds of Salami" »

In Pennsylvania's first precedent-setting decision regarding hormone replacement therapy mass tort litigation, the Superior Court has revived a plaintiff's lawsuit by finding that the plaintiff was entitled to an exception to the two-year statute of limitations because she couldn't have reasonably known of an alleged link between her breast cancer and HRT drugs before the publication of a widely publicized study.

Continue reading "Pa. Court Revives Plaintiff Verdict in Hormone-Replacement Case" »

Baxter International Inc., which recalled its blood thinner heparin amid reports of allergic reactions and deaths in 2008, faces at least 30 lawsuits in Chicago by injured people or their estates.

As many as 300 product-liability complaints may be filed in the Illinois state court, according to plaintiffs’ attorney Allen Schwartz. His law firm and two others are working to comply with a judge’s order last year to convert an aggregate lawsuit to individual claims against the Deerfield, Illinois-based company.

Continue reading "Baxter Faces New Lawsuits Over Tainted Heparin" »

Byetta (exenatide) is a type 2 diabetes drug that is used to control blood sugar levels. It is part of a class of medications known as incretin mimetics, which imitate natural hormones that lower blood glucose levels. Last month, the FDA expanded the use of Byetta to a stand-alone diabetes treatment, but insisted that warnings about the risk of pancreatitis from Byetta be added to the label and will require additional studies.

Continue reading "Byetta Lawsuit Update Dallas Texas Attorney" »

The FDA has warned Amylin Pharmaceuticals that they have made false and misleading statements about the diabetes drug Byetta.

The FDA letter was sent to Amylin Pharmaceuticals, alerting the company that federal regulators were aware of statements made by representatives that provided misleading or false information about the benefits of their product.

Download the FDA Warning Letter here.
Download file

Continue reading "FDA Calls Byetta Claims Misleading Dallas Byetta Attorney" »

When we reviewed the litigation over AstraZeneca's antipsychotic Seroquel in June, there was debate over whether the litigation was a bust for the thousands of plaintiffs who'd filed suits claiming the drug caused their diabetes.

Delaware court judge, who had just tossed a Seroquel case on Daubert grounds, warned in his opinion that plaintiffs had yet to establish that link successfully. But plaintiffs lawyer Paul Pennock of Weitz & Luxenberg cautioned us to reserve judgment. "Far from going away, Seroquel is about to reveal AstraZeneca as one of the worst managers of a mass tort litigation in history," he said.

Read the full article here.

Continue reading "Seroquel Plaintiffs Lose Diabetes Claim in Delaware" »

A recent lawsuit brought by a group of Indiana National Guardsman spotlights a controversial legal doctrine that prevents soldiers on active duty from seeking compensation for injuries sustained in war zones.

The guardsman allege that a mission to help clean up a water treatment plant in southern Iraq left them with what they say are potentially fatal illnesses.

Read full Wall St Journal Article here.

Continue reading "Soldiers Fight in the Courts Over Liability in War Zones " »

BP must pay more than $100 million in damages for exposing contract workers to toxic substances at its Texas City oil refinery in April 2007, a federal jury in Galveston said in the latest setback for the troubled plant.

The mammoth verdict arose out of a case brought by a BP contractor who claimed the British oil giant's failure to maintain equipment and provide adequate safety controls led to a poisonous chemical release that sent more than 100 workers to area hospitals on the evening of April 19, 2007.

The company said it was “shocked and outraged” by the jury's decision and vowed to appeal.

Continue reading "Jury orders BP to pay $100 M for Exposing Workers to Toxic Substances" »

A Sioux Falls woman is accusing Johnson and Johnson and two mining companies of failing for decades to warn consumers about a link between ovarian cancer and talcum powder.

Deane Berg, 52, applied talc-based body powder to her perineum each day after showering from 1975 to 2007, she says in a federal lawsuit filed last week. She contracted ovarian cancer in 2006.

Berg maintains that talc caused her cancer and that the companies selling the mineral knew there was a risk but failed to warn the public.

Continue reading "Lawsuit Filed Against Talc Producers For Cancer Link," »

After 13 hours of intensifying pain, two trips to the emergency room and two CT scans, doctors finally found what was ailing Lottie Green.

In her left lung, the pulmonologist told her, was the largest blood clot they had ever seen and there were others in her right lung as well, she said.

Soon after the 41-year-old Bethesda, Md., resident was released from a hospital last month, Ms. Green joined hundreds of other women in lawsuits against Germany's Bayer AG, the maker of the popular oral contraceptive Yaz.

Continue reading "Fort Worth Texas Yaz Yasmin Birth Control Lawsuit Update" »

The U.S. Food & Drug Administration is weighing further regulation of three drugs used to create high-contrast images on MRI scans, based on a new analysis that suggests they carry a higher risk of causing a rare, but potentially fatal disease.

The issue, marks a setback for GE Healthcare (GE), which contends that its product is no riskier than competing imaging drugs. FDA reviewers said GE's drug, Omniscan, had a disproportionately high number of reports of the disease compared with its peers.

Continue reading "FDA Review Says MRI Imaging Drugs That Contain Gadolinium Riskier for Kidney Patients " »

A consumer advocacy group is petitioning the government to ban the weight loss pill Meridia because a recent study suggests it increases risk of heart attack, stroke and death.

A letter Thursday from Public Citizen calls on the Food and Drug Administration to pull Abbott Laboratories' drug from the U.S. market, where it is used by roughly a quarter million people.

Preliminary results from a 10,000-patient study — known as the SCOUT study — showed a slightly higher risk of heart-related problems in patients taking Meridia, also called sibutramine, compared with a dummy pill. Patients in the study were older than 55, overweight with a history of heart disease or diabetes.

Continue reading "Public Citizen Asks FDA to Ban Weight Loss Pill" »

A funeral is set for a retired Indiana National Guard commander who testified in October that exposure to a lethal carcinogen in Iraq caused his cancer.

Lt. Col. James C. Gentry, 52, Williams, Ind., died of lung cancer. His death is a marker in a pending federal lawsuit; his life inspired a federal bill working its way through Congress.

Continue reading "Guard Commander Said KBR Carcinogen Caused his Cancer" »

Once upon a time, asbestos was practically everywhere. Because the material causes devastating forms of cancer and lung disease, huge product-liability litigation sprung up. That led to huge settlements, which led to the establishment of huge trusts, created to assure payment to millions of current and future claimants.

Some $20 billion now resides in these 40 or so trusts, set up by Johns Manville Corp., Owens Corning and other former makers and sellers of asbestos. But who’s overseeing the trusts? Is the money getting spent properly? In short, are the trusts working as designed?

Continue reading "Asbestos Mesothelioma Payout System is Being Questioned" »

A Florida jury ordered cigarette maker Philip Morris USA to pay $300 million in damages to a 61-year-old ex-smoker named Cindy Naugle who is wheelchair-bound by emphysema.

The Broward Circuit Court jury assessed $56.6 million in past and future medical expenses against the company, part of Altria Group Inc, as well as $244 million in punitive damages.

The verdict is the largest of the so-called Engle progeny cases that have been tried so far, both sides said.

Philip Morris will seek further review of the verdict because of "numerous erroneous rulings by the trial judge," Philip Morris spokesman Murray Garnick said in a statement.

Continue reading "Philip Morris Ordered to Pay $300 M to Smoker" »

Two men who became seriously ill after working at a Hicksville magazine distributor located atop a former nuclear fuel plant have been awarded $12 million in a federal negligence lawsuit against Verizon Communications Inc.

Gerard DePascale, and Liam Neville, each were awarded $5 million, and DePascale's wife, Joanne, $2 million, after their lawyers successfully argued the men were sickened by toxins that remained at the site years after operations ceased in 1967.

Continue reading "Jury Awards $12M in Verizon Toxic Waste Lawsuit" »

Maximiliano Calcaño is 2 and was born with no arms. Maximiliano's mother, Anajai Calcaño, lives in a small house with no indoor plumbing in a rural village in northern Dominican Republic, not far from where coal ash generated by Virginia-based AES Corp. wound up at the edge of the sea.

More than 50,000 tons of coal ash laden with heavy metals was left at a port abutting local homes for years while the company, politicians, prosecutors, environmental activists and bureaucrats argued -- and residents got sick.

Continue reading "Dominican Republic blames U.S.Power Company for Birth Defects" »

Maximiliano Calcaño is 2 and was born with no arms. Maximiliano's mother, Anajai Calcaño, lives in a small house with no indoor plumbing in a rural village in northern Dominican Republic, not far from where coal ash generated by Virginia-based AES Corp. wound up at the edge of the sea.

More than 50,000 tons of coal ash laden with heavy metals was left at a port abutting local homes for years while the company, politicians, prosecutors, environmental activists and bureaucrats argued -- and residents got sick.

Continue reading "Dominican Republic blames U.S.Power Company for Birth Defects" »

Ten months after millions of cubic yards of coal ash spilled from a Tennessee Valley Authority dam, Gary Topmiller and his wife, Pam, said they are trapped in their home across the Emory River from the site and "living in hell."

Topmiller was among several people who spoke to reporters about their problems since Dec. 22, when a breach in an earthen dike at TVA's Kingston Fossil Plant sent 5.4 million cubic yards of ash into the Emory River and onto private property.

Continue reading "Property Owner Near TVA Ash Spill Has Medical Problems" »

The Chinese drywall product liability complaint is now nearly a year old. And while incidents of Chinese drywall being installed in homes have all but stopped, complaints of bloody noses, sinus infections and vomiting spells for pets and people, widespread corrosion and blackening of copper tubing and wiring and "rotten egg" smell continue to escalate. Last spring, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission conducted 44 investigations into consumer complaints about drywall.

Continue reading "Updated Findings from the Chinese Drywall Report" »

An Air Force veteran and a one-time contractor who served in Iraq are suing military contractors Halliburton Co. and KBR Inc., claiming that the companies exposed them to toxic fumes by burning everything from human remains to tires in massive open-air pits.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Louisville by former Air Force Sgt. Sean Alexander Stough and ex-contractor Charles Hicks.

"The burn pits are still going on," said attorney Susan Burke, who represents the men.

The suit names Houston-based companies KBR and Halliburton, as well as the Turkish company ERKA Ltd. The lawsuit is the latest on behalf of former military members and contract workers who claim they were exposed to toxins from burning waste in the warzone. At least 32 suits over burn pits have been filed in 32 states.

Continue reading "Halliburton Co. and KBR Inc. Military Contractors Sued over Iraq 'Burn Pits'" »

Balsamic and other red wine vinegars often contain lead, a potent neurotoxin, and could pose a risk to children who consume it regularly, according to a new analysis by Environmental Health News.

Eating just one tablespoon a day of some vinegars can raise a young child's lead level by more than 30 percent, modeling requested by the news service shows.

Lead can damage people's neurological systems, particularly children's developing brains. Even low levels can reduce a child's IQ or trigger learning and behavioral disorders, scientific studies show. In adults, it has been linked to cardiovascular, kidney and immune system effects.

The heavy metal is so toxic and persistent in the body that there is no known threshold below which adverse effects do not occur, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Continue reading "Lead in Red Wine vinegars Could Cause Toxic Injury " »

A Pennsylvania landowner is suing an energy company for polluting his soil and water by a natural gas drilling technique.

George Zimmermann, the owner of 480 acres in Washington County, southwest Pennsylvania, says Atlas Energy Inc. ruined his land with toxic chemicals used in or released there by hydraulic fracturing.

Water tests at three locations by gas wells on Zimmermann's property -- one is 1,500 feet from his home -- found seven potentially carcinogenic chemicals above "screening levels" set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Continue reading "Pa Lawsuit Says Gas Drilling Polluted Ground Water" »

Smokers who want to quit and think a good first step is to switch to light or low-tar cigarettes are making a big mistake. A study has found that those smokers instead have about a 50% lower chance of giving up smoking.

The research, published in the November issue of Tobacco Control, analyzed survey data from about 31,000 smokers who were asked whether they had switched to a milder or low-tar brand of cigarettes and the reasons for the switch. They were queried about whether they had tried to give up smoking and if they could currently call themselves nonsmokers. Those who switched brands were 58% more likely to have attempted to give up smoking than those who stayed with one brand but were 60% less likely to successfully quit.

Continue reading "Light Cigarettes may not help Smokers Quit" »

The 3rd District Court of Appeal reversed a $24.2 million verdict Wednesday, striking a Miami-Dade jury award to a Weston, Fla., surgeon who claimed asbestos exposure caused his terminal cancer.

In a unanimous unsigned opinion, the three-judge panel remanded the products liability lawsuit by Dr. Stephen Guilder against Honeywell International and ordered a new trial.

Guilder won one of the highest compensatory damage awards against a single defendant in a mesothelioma case in April 2008. He died before the appeal was decided.

He claimed he developed the rare peritoneal mesothelioma from exposure to asbestos by remodeling an attic, working in road construction and repairing cars in the 1970s and 1980s.

Continue reading "Appeals Court Reverses $24.2 M Verdict in Asbestos Mesothelioma Case" »

A federal jury found Exxon Mobil liable for contaminating groundwater in New York City and awarded the city $104.7 million in compensatory damages.

The city had sought $250 million in damages to finance construction of a treatment plant to make the water in five wells in southeastern Queens drinkable. But lawyers for the city called the jury’s decision a “total victory” for their side.

Dozens of similar cases are pending against oil companies nationwide over the contamination of groundwater by the additive M.T.B.E., which is highly soluble in water and has leaked from underground storage tanks across the country.

Continue reading "NY City Awarded $105 M in Exxon Mobil Toxic Lawsuit " »

A lawsuit against a Swiss pharmaceutical company went to trial last week in Missoula, but a verdict in the case could have national significance for hundreds of plaintiffs suing the company in a mass tort.

Peggy L. Stevens of Missoula filed suit against Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. last year, alleging the company was professionally negligent when it failed to disclose health risks associated with one of its medications.

Stevens, who has lymphoma, developed severe dental and jaw-related problems after taking Zometa, a bone-strengthening medication manufactured by Novartis. Her attorneys say the company knew patients taking Zometa were vulnerable to a degenerative jaw disorder called osteonecrosis, particularly those patients who undergo invasive dental procedures, like root canals or tooth extractions.

Continue reading " Zometa Lawsuit Against Novartis Pharmaceuticals Underway" »

A lawsuit against a Swiss pharmaceutical company went to trial last week in Missoula, but a verdict in the case could have national significance for hundreds of plaintiffs suing the company in a mass tort.

Peggy L. Stevens of Missoula filed suit against Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. last year, alleging the company was professionally negligent when it failed to disclose health risks associated with one of its medications.

Stevens, who has lymphoma, developed severe dental and jaw-related problems after taking Zometa, a bone-strengthening medication manufactured by Novartis. Her attorneys say the company knew patients taking Zometa were vulnerable to a degenerative jaw disorder called osteonecrosis, particularly those patients who undergo invasive dental procedures, like root canals or tooth extractions.

Continue reading " Zometa Lawsuit Against Novartis Pharmaceuticals Underway" »

Under rules to be proposed this week, the Department of Veterans Affairs plans to add Parkinson’s disease, ischemic heart disease and hairy-cell leukemia to the growing list of illnesses presumed to have been caused by Agent Orange, the toxic defoliant used widely in Vietnam.

The proposal will make it substantially easier for thousands of veterans to claim that those ailments were the direct result of their service in Vietnam, thereby for them to receive monthly disability checks and health care services from the department.

The new policy will apply to some 2.1 million veterans who set foot in Vietnam during the war, including those who came after the military stopped using Agent Orange in 1970. It will not apply to sailors on deep-water ships, though the department plans to study the effects of Agent Orange on the Navy.

Continue reading "New Rules Opens Toxic Injury Health Claims to Agent Orange " »

The Ivory family's dreams of a relaxing retirement on Florida's Gulf Coast were put on hold when they discovered their new home had been built with Chinese drywall that emits sulfuric fumes and corrodes pipes. It got worse when they asked their insurer for help — and not only was their claim denied, but they've been told their entire policy won't be renewed.

Thousands of homeowners nationwide who bought new houses constructed from the defective building materials are finding that insurers drop policies or send notices of non-renewal based on the presence of the Chinese drywall.

Continue reading "Home Insurers Discontinuing Chinese Drywall Policies" »

Thirty members of the West Virginia National Guard filed a lawsuit in Marshall County Circuit Court, WVA, alleging that they were negligently exposed to a highly toxic chemical as they guarded a rebuilding project in Iraq in 2003.

The lawsuit contends that members of the Moundsville-based 1092nd Engineer Battalion of the West Virginia National Guard were deployed to the Qarmat Ali water plant near Basra from April to June 2003. The soldiers guarded the facility while KBR Inc. contractors repaired the plant.

Continue reading "30 W.Va. National Guardsmen sue KBR over alleged chemicals exposure" »

The Southern Union gas company was ordered to pay $18 million for illegally storing mercury waste, which was exposed to the public five years ago when vandals stole the hazardous liquid from a rundown building and spilled it at an apartment complex.

U.S. District Judge fined the Texas company $6 million and ordered an additional $12 million in payments to the community, saying it had committed a "serious crime" by storing liquid mercury at a neglected building in Pawtucket without the required permit.

"It must be enough to get the attention of other companies who might be doing the same thing," the judge said of his penalty.

Continue reading "RI Orders Texas-based Southern Union to Pay $18 M in Mercury Storage Case" »

Asbestos lawsuits are filed by plaintiffs who have suffered as the result of asbestos-related illness. Plaintiffs in asbestos lawsuits can include the victims of asbestos exposure, or their families or loved ones. Defendants against asbestos lawsuits are those parties considered responsible for the asbestos exposure. In the past, targets of asbestos lawsuits have included:

* Employers
* Asbestos manufacturers
* Asbestos installers
* Landlords
* Leasing agents

Continue reading "Dallas Texas Asbestos Lawsuits" »

A faint rotten-egg smell drifts off a covered lagoon a hundred yards from a well-traveled Missouri gravel road.

This is battleground -- ground zero in what some see as a high-stakes fight for the future of Missouri agriculture.

But in Kansas City law offices 80 miles away, combatants prepare for another showdown over the smells drifting from this 80,000-head hog operation.

Is the stench an obnoxious affront to neighbors or simply the "odor of agriculture" that comes with life in the country?

Continue reading "Missouri Hog Lawsuits and Toxic Environmental Pollution" »

When he began getting weak, 61-year-old Ronald Beaver figured he might just be feeling his age. Eventually his problem was traced to a serious blood disorder caused by low levels of copper.

It wasn't until several weeks later — after the man from Tamarac, Fla., started getting daily doses of copper — that Beaver's doctor mentioned that getting too much zinc can trigger loss of copper.

The only source of that much zinc they surmised was the tubes of PoliGrip denture cream he had been overusing for a decade.

Continue reading "Overuse of Denture Cream with Zinc Leads to Lawsuits" »

Oklahoma brought a pollution lawsuit in 2005 against the Arkansas poultry industry, suggesting the threat of legal action may have spurred the companies to do better at policing themselves.

''The water quality is getting better, and this year, especially, we had very little algae,'' said Archie ''Trey'' Peyton III, 35, a former environmental consultant.

''There's got to be a reason for that, which to me it follows that the last two years that most of the poultry litter in this region has been trucked out. But it looks to me like that's making an impact on the river,'' Peyton said.

But Oklahoma says the industry needs to do more, and its closely watched case against 11 companies -- including food giants Tyson Foods Inc. and Cargill Inc. -- goes to trial Thursday.

It's been a long-standing practice among poultry farmers in the Illinois River watershed to spread their chickens' droppings on their fields. But as big business took over the production of broilers, the amount of waste being spread on local fields ballooned -- to an estimated 345,000 tons annually in recent years, according to Oklahoma.

Continue reading "Oklahoma to File Lawsuit Against Big Poultry" »

New environmental tests confirm extremely high levels of dioxin, the toxic ingredient of Agent Orange, in people, fish and soil near a former U.S. air base where American troops stored the herbicide during the Vietnam War.

"Time is of the essence" to finish cleaning up the site, now home to the Danang airport, where dioxin levels in the soil, sediment and fish were 300 to 400 times higher than internationally accepted levels, the survey by the Canadian environmental firm Hatfield Consultants said.

The survey also found that temporary containment measures jointly implemented by the U.S. and Vietnam in 2007 have apparently resulted in lower dioxin levels in people who live near the site.

Continue reading "Dioxin levels high in Vietnam near US base" »

ACROSS THE NATION: Controversies brew over possible toxic emissions

Almost a year after tests by USA TODAY found significant levels of two potentially toxic metals in the air outside the school, local health officials expanded their own monitoring efforts here. The reason: Air samples taken by the county earlier this year showed even higher levels of the metals than what USA TODAY found — on two days, at least nine times more.

Highlands, flanked by two metals plants, is among scores of schools where regulators — local, state or federal — are monitoring outdoor air for toxic chemicals, many that pose unique dangers to kids. The monitoring is not required by law but came in response to the USA TODAY investigation that identified hundreds of schools where chemicals from nearby industries may permeate the air.

Continue reading "Testing for Toxics at Schools Sparks Lawsuits " »

A lawsuit alleging that Merck & Co's osteoporosis drug Fosamax caused jaw damage ended in a mistrial on Friday .

U.S. District Judge John Keenan declared the mistrial two days giving the New York jury considering the case a "cooling off period" in light of supposed acrimony among jurors.

A Merck lawyer on Wednesday referred to an "unsubstantiated claim" of a chair being thrown in the jury room.

Merck faces lawsuits involving almost 900 cases by patients who say the use of Fosamax causes osteonecrosis of the jaw, or the death of jawbone tissue. The trial is Merck's first over the drug

Continue reading "Merck Lawsuit Over Fosamax ends in Mistrial" »

A federal judge presiding over hundreds of lawsuits against Chinese drywall makers and installers said Thursday that he plans to hold the first trial in January 2010 for the cases, which claim the imported products emit sulfur, methane and other chemical compounds that have ruined homes and harmed residents' health.

U.S. District Judge Eldon Fallon told attorneys that he expects them to pick six plaintiffs whose cases could be tried in early 2010, with the first trial starting in January.

Kerry Miller, a lead lawyer for companies named as defendants in the suits, said defense attorneys may need more time to prepare for the first batch of bellwether trials. Russ Herman, a lead plaintiffs lawyer, said he supports Fallon's scheduling plan.

Continue reading "Trial Set For January 2010 on Chinese Drywall" »

The number of Chinese drywall manufacturers responsible for corrosion and potential health problems plaguing U.S. homeowners may be about to increase substantially.

With the first set of home inspections about to begin in the massive combined Chinese drywall litigation playing out in New Orleans, lawyers involved in the case were told to document the different identifying markings on wallboard found in affected homes.

On Thursday, they revealed that 36 separate variations of tainted drywall have been found -- a much higher number than previously disclosed.

While some manufacturers may have more than one way of marking their product and some markings were stamped by distributors, the three dozen variations opens the door to a host of new companies publicly joining the mix.

Continue reading "Number of Implicated Chinese Drywall Manufacturers Increases." »

Asbestos is well recognized as a health hazard and is highly regulated. An estimated 1.3 million employees in the construction and general industry face significant asbestos exposure on the job. Heaviest exposures occur in the construction industry, particularly during the removal of asbestos during renovation or demolition.

Employees are also likely to be exposed during the manufacture of asbestos products (such as textiles, friction products, insulation, and other building materials) and during automotive brake and clutch repair work.

Continue reading "Fort Worth Texas Asbestos Mesothelioma Lawsuits" »

On Oct. 18, 2005, plaintiff Alvin Greenberg, 58, disabled, suffered from an overdose of Zyprexa. He had been administered the drug by the staff at the Green Acres Rehabilitation and Nursing Center, in Wyndmoor, where he was a resident; the order for the anti-psychotic medication had been called into the facility by his treating physician three days earlier.

Greenberg's daughter and power-of-attorney, Alicia Greenberg, sued Green Acres, Melanio Aguirre, Greenberg's attending physician, and Aguirre's practice, claiming negligence, in order to recover personal injury damages. Prior to trial Greenberg settled with Green Acres for an undisclosed amount but Green Acres still remained in the action as a defendant.

Plaintiff's counsel alleged that Greenberg was given 10 times the proper amount of Zyprexa, causing Greenberg to require an emergency room admission for Zyprexa toxicity. According to counsel, when Aguirre spoke to the nurse by telephone on Oct. 15, it wasn't clear whether Aguirre directed the nurse to give Greenberg 25 mg or 2.5 mg of the medication. Plaintiff's counsel asserted that both Aguirre and the nursing home were liable for the overdose because they didn't ensure that Greenberg receive the proper dosage of the medication he required.

Continue reading "Nursing Home Medical Malpractice: Staff Dispensed 10 times Correct Dosage" »

Exxon Mobil Corp. lost the second phase of a trial in which New York City accused the company of poisoning the city’s groundwater, with a jury ruling that a gasoline additive will remain in water wells for years.

The case is part of larger litigation over methyl tertiary butyl ether, or MTBE. More than 70 lawsuits filed by water providers and state and local governments were consolidated before U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin for pretrial information-gathering, according to an industry Web site.

An 11-member jury decided today that MTBE will contaminate the output of six affected wells at a peak level of 10 parts per billion in 2033. The verdict came on the third day of deliberations, less than two hours after jurors told Scheindlin they were deadlocked on a part of the case.

Continue reading "Exxon Loses Second Phase of New York Water-Well Trial " »

Camp Lejeune residents blame rare breast cancer cluster on the water.
For three decades, dry-cleaning chemicals and industrial solvents laced the water used by local Marines and their families. Mike Partain and at least 19 others developed male breast cancer.

One night in April 2007, as Mike Partain hugged his wife before going to bed, she felt a small lump above his right nipple. A mammogram -- a "man-o-gram," he called it -- led to a diagnosis of male breast cancer. Six days later, the 41-year-old insurance adjuster had a mastectomy.

Partain had no idea men could get breast cancer. But he thinks he knows what caused his: contaminated drinking water at Camp Lejeune, N.C., where he was born.

Over the last two years, Partain has compiled a list of 19 others diagnosed with male breast cancer who once lived on the base.

Continue reading "Camp Lejeune Residents Blame Rare Breast Cancer Cluster on the Water." »

For three decades, dry-cleaning chemicals and industrial solvents laced the water used by local Marines and their families. Mike Partain and at least 19 others developed male breast cancer.

One night in April 2007, as Mike Partain hugged his wife before going to bed, she felt a small lump above his right nipple. A mammogram led to a diagnosis of male breast cancer. Six days later, the 41-year-old insurance adjuster had a mastectomy.

Over the last two years, Partain has compiled a list of 19 others diagnosed with male breast cancer who once lived on the base.

Continue reading "Camp Lejeune Residents Blame Breast Cancer on the Water" »

Denture Cream Lawsuit – Zinc Poisoning Symptoms

It has increasingly been reported that the denture cream ingredient zinc is associated with neurological symptoms including neuropathy in denture wearers. The recommended daily allowance of zinc is 8 mg for women and 11 mg for men. According to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies the largest daily tolerable zinc intake is 40 mg.

Fixodent denture adhesive and alleged Fixodent zinc poisoning is complicated by the fact zinc, as a trace element, is part of a healthy diet. Denture cream zinc poisoning happens when too much zinc is used.

According to the official Fixodent web site, "the amount of zinc an average denture adhesive user would ingest from daily usage of Fixodent" is less than the amount of zinc contained in most daily multivitamins, or fewer than 6 oysters.

Continue reading "Poligrip and Fixodent Denture Cream Use Leads to Zinc Poisoning" »

About 11% of the U.S. market for oral contraceptives is now accounted for by Yasmin, a combination pill containing the novel progestin, drospirenone, in combination with ethinyl estradiol (EE).

Yaz lawsuits are personal injury cases in which women injured after taking Yaz birth control seek compensation for their injuries and losses.

Both Yaz and Yasmin birth control pills are known to potentially cause life-threatening side effects including blood clots, heart attacks, stroke, deep vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism and liver damage.

Yasmin was introduced earlier (approved in 2001 by the FDA), and has a slightly higher EE level:

* Yasmin—3 mg drospirenone and 30 mcg EE per tablet
* Yaz—3 mg drospirenone and 20 mcg EE per tablet

Continue reading "Yaz Yasmin Birth Control Side Effects" »

Side effects of Yaz birth control could increase the risk of life-threatening injuries. Yaz lawsuits are being reviewed nationwide.

Yaz, which is nearly identical to Yasmin birth control, is a newer type of oral contraceptive sold by Bayer. It has been aggressively marketed without adequate warnings about potentially life-threatening side effects.

This site provides Yasmin lawsuit information and the latest news regarding Yasmin side effects and problems. This relatively new birth control has been marketed heavily to women in the United States and is one of the first contraceptives considered a “fourth generation” birth control pill.

It is manufactured by Bayer which also markets Yaz birth control. Generic Yasmin is marketed as “Ocella” and is manufactured by Teva. Yasmin is a combination hormonal contraceptive. It contains the hormones ethinyl estradiol (estrogen) and drospirenone which is a synthetic form of progestin.

Continue reading "Yaz Yasmin Birth Control Information and Lawsuits" »

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced today that it is reviewing adverse event reports of liver injury in patients taking the weight loss drug orlistat, marketed as the prescription drug Xenical and the over-the-counter medication Alli.

Between 1999 and 2008, the FDA received 32 reports of serious liver injury in patients taking orlistat. Of those cases, 27 reported hospitalization and six resulted in liver failure. Thirty of the adverse events occurred outside the United States. The most commonly reported adverse events included yellowing of the skin or whites of the eyes (jaundice), weakness, and stomach pain.

The FDA is reviewing additional data submitted by orlistat manufacturers on suspected cases of liver injury, and the issue has been discussed at the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research Drug Safety Oversight Board.

“The issues here are complex, but FDA has benefited from the input of the Board, including comments from representatives from three FDA Centers and several other Agencies in the Department of Health and Human Services,” said Steven Osborne, M.D., executive director of the Board.

Continue reading "FDA: Safety Review of Weight Loss Drugs Orlistat, Xenical and Alli" »

The Yaz birth control pill has been on the market since 2006. Yaz is taken orally once daily to prevent pregnancy.

Yaz differs from other birth control methods because it contains a progestin hormone called drospirenone, which can increase potassium levels in the bloodstream. Yasmin, a birth control drug very similar to Yaz, has been on the market since 2001. It contains the same hormone as Yaz and is associated with the same health issues.

Continue reading "Yaz Birth Control Dangers and Lawsuits" »

Yaz and Yasmin manufacturers are now involved in multiple Federal and State lawsuits.

In October of 2008, a warning letter was sent by the Food and Drug Administration to Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Inc., in response to claims the company had made for Yaz, a very popular and heavily promoted birth control pill.

The warning letter stated that Yaz has additional risks compared to other birth control pills because it contains drospirenone, a progestin hormone that can increase potassium levels.

Among the serious and debilitating injuries reported from the birth control pills are heart attacks, blood clots, strokes, pulmonary embolisms, deep vein thrombosis, gall bladder disease, and other serious injuries. Some deaths have even occurred.

Continue reading "Yaz, Yasmin and Pulmonary Embolism, Stroke, Heart Attack" »

Bronchiolitis Obliterans also known as Popcorn Workers Lung, is an obstructive lung disease in which the bronchioles of the lungs are blocked by the growth of fibrous tissue.

The moniker Popcorn Workers Lung has been given to Bronchiolitis Obliterans because workers in factories that make microwavable popcorn that uses diacetyl for the buttery flavoring are known to contract the disease. The disease is irreversible, and can become so severe that a lung transplant may be necessary. Popcorn Workers Lung is a rare disorder that is known to be caused by repeated exposure to toxic gases, namely diacetyl.

Continue reading "Popcorn Workers Lung - Bronchiolitis Obliterans" »

Yaz and Yasmin are popular and widely-used oral contraceptives targeting women with the promises of worry free contraception. But there is potentially life threatening Yasmin side effects and Yaz side effects.Yaz was recently targeted by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a prescription drug that is more dangerous and less effective than advertised by Bayer Healthcare Pharmaceuticals.

In mid-August 2009, the results of two new studies of oral contraceptives, including Yaz and Yasmin, were released in the British Medical Journal Online. The studies showed that Yaz, Yasmin and the generic form of Yaz, Ocella, caused a six-fold increase in the risk of blood clots, which cause injuries such as Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) and Pulmonary Embolism (PE).

Continue reading "Yaz Lawsuit" »

The Food and Drug Administration has issued warnings to eight companies for illegally marketing pain relief ointments containing ibuprofen.

Regulators said in a statement Thursday the companies do not have federal permission to market their products, which mix the popular pain relief drug with other ingredients. While ibuprofen is available in a variety of tablets like Advil, the FDA has not approved any ointments containing the drug.

"These companies have an obligation to demonstrate to the FDA that their products are safe and effective, and they have failed to do so," said Deborah Autor, director of FDA's office of compliance.

Continue reading "FDA Cracks Down on Ibuprofen Pain Relief Gels" »

Yasmin is an oral contraceptive pill made by Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Inc. that has been linked to heart attack, stroke, and blood clots in users. Women taking the drug to prevent pregnancy or to treat emotional and physical symptoms of PMDD (Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder) and moderate acne have suffered severe injuries and even died as a result.

The drug has been linked to 50 or more deaths in the United States between 2004 and 2008 in addition to many other injuries. Bayer has been named in numerous lawsuits filed on behalf of women who were injured or died as a result of taking Yasmin.

Yasmin was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2006. A lower-dose version of the same drug, called Yaz, was approved in 2001. Yasmin is essentially the same drug as Yaz and uses a different kind of hormone than other birth-control pills, a drug called DRSP (drospirenone). DRSP has been shown to increase potassium in the body, which raises the possibility of severe health complications for women with kidney (renal) disease and cardiovascular conditions.

Continue reading "Yaz and Yasmin: Birth Control Pill Has Caused Patient Deaths, Heart Attack, and Stroke" »

If you believe you may have been harmed by the use of Avandia, it is important to note that your time to file a lawsuit against the maker of the drug could be running out. The statute of limitations in many states is coming up soon, and there still may be people who do not realize that the injury they have suffered could be related to their Avandia use.

New research shows that diabetics treated with the popular drug Avandia have higher risk of heart failure and death than those taking Actos, leading Canadian scientists to conclude that "continued use of [Avandia] may not be justified."

The findings, published in today's edition of the British Medical Journal, are the latest blow to the controversial blockbuster drug, manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline Inc.

Researchers stressed that the findings are relative and that Actos, a product of Takeda Pharmaceuticals North America Inc., also poses heart risks, albeit lesser ones.

Continue reading "Avandia Risk of Heart Failure and Lawsuits" »

When Kari and Ron Craton moved a few years ago to a more rural area of southwestern Michigan, they were seeking a more rustic life. What they got was more rust.

Government officials say food-processing plants that turn raw crops into products have contaminated the water-supply wells of the Cratons and other property owners in agricultural areas of Michigan and could do the same in other states. Residents claim increased amounts of metals in water drawn from their wells have killed their pets, ruined their plumbing and made their houses impossible to sell or rent.

Continue reading "Wastewater From MI Food Plants Getting Into Home Water Wells" »

A dye used in MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) and MRA (magnetic resonance angiography) scans has been linked to a rare and potentially fatal skin disease in some users.

The problem stems from the metal gadolinium found in the dyes injected into some patients before MRI scans and all patients before MRA scans.

The disease is known as nephrogenic systemic fibrosis or nephrogenic fibrosing dermopathy (NSF/NFD), and appears to only occur in patients with kidney disease who undergo an MRI or MRA where a gadolinium-based dye is used.

Continue reading "Gadolinium Nephrogenic Systemic Fibrosis (MRI Dye) and Lawsuits" »

A government test of fish pulled from nearly 300 streams in the USA found every one of them contaminated with some level of mercury.

The U.S. Geological Survey's research marks its most comprehensive examination of mercury contamination in stream fish. The study found that 27% of the fish had mercury levels high enough to exceed what the Environmental Protection Agency considers safe for the average fish eater, those who eat fish twice a week.

But the findings in wild-caught fish underscore how widespread mercury contamination in the nation's waterways has become. Previous research has found levels of concern in ocean and lake fish.

Continue reading "Mercury Found in all Fish Caught in U.S.-Tested Streams" »

The Fleet Phospho-soda attorneys at Dr. Shezad Malik Law Firm are investigating potential lawsuits for individuals who have suffered severe kidney damage after a colonoscopy prep where Fleet Phospho-soda was used.

While most patients only became aware of the potential for Fleet Phospho-soda kidney problems when the product was recalled in December 2008, the manufacturer has been aware of the potential side effects for years.

Continue reading "Fleet Phospho Soda Side Effects and Lawsuits" »

Fleet Phospho Soda, a laxative product used for varying applications, was the subject of a December 2008 consumer alert from the FDA (the U.S. Food and Drug Administration). The alert warned that the use of phosphate-based laxatives such as Fleet Phospho Soda could result in kidney failure, even among individuals who do not have a medical condition that puts them at risk for kidney failure.

Fleet Phospho Soda is available without a prescription, it is a non-prescription laxative. It is widely used to clean the intestines before a colonoscopy and other medical procedures.

The Phospho Soda works by drawing fluid from the rest of the body into the colon; if an individual does not consume enough water or other fluids during Phospho Soda use, he or she may become dehydrated. The individual's level of phosphate salts in the kidneys may also become too high — a development that can result in a type of kidney damage called acute phosphate nephropathy (APN).

Continue reading "Fleet Phospho Soda and Kidney Damage" »

Avandia, an oral medication produced by GlaxoSmithKline, improves control of blood glucose levels in individuals with type-2 diabetes. Despite its ability to make insulin receptors more sensitive, Avandia does have some serious associated risks, as it can increase the chances that patients' develop:

* stroke
* congestive heart failure
* heart attack
* liver toxicity
* severe allergic reactions

Continue reading "Avandia Death Risk and Lawsuits" »

January 2008, Courtney Rohn dashed in for a takeout order at a Homestead restaurant.

A day later the 32-year-old mom died at Homestead Hospital. An autopsy showed that she died of a bacterial infection in the blood.

Now her family has filed suit in Miami-Dade Circuit Court against El Toro Taco, in connection with Rohn's takeout order. The lawsuit alleges the bacterial infection was caused from food poisoning and was exacerbated from Rohn having her spleen removed.

Rohn's mother and stepfather, Margaret and Walter Armstrong, are alleging two counts of negligence, two counts of strict liability and violations of The Florida Food Safety Act.

Continue reading "Florida Wrongful Death Lawsuit From Food Poisoning" »

New studies point to an increased risk of Paxil birth defects in babies whose mothers use the antidepressant during pregnancy. According to the findings of two studies, women who were taking Paxil during their first trimester were one and a half to two times more likely to have a baby with a heart defect than women who were taking other antidepressants or women of the general population.

A study published in the February 2006 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine found that maternal use of the antidepressant Paxil increased the risk—by as much as six times—of a birth defect known as persistent pulmonary hypertension, or PPHN.

Babies born with PPHN have difficulty circulating oxygen through their bodies because of constricted blood vessels in the heart and lungs.

Continue reading "Paxil Side Effects and Birth Defects" »

Yaz prevents ovulation and causes changes in the cervical and uterine lining, making it harder for sperm to reach the uterus and harder for a fertilized egg to attach to the uterus.

Yaz is used as contraception to prevent pregnancy.

Yaz is contraindicated if you are pregnant or if you have any of the following conditions: a history of stroke or blood clot, breast or uterine cancer, abnormal vaginal bleeding, kidney or liver disease, an adrenal gland disorder, severe high blood pressure, migraine headaches, or a history of jaundice caused by birth control pills.

Continue reading "Yaz Information and Side Effects" »

The Food and Drug Administration is warning consumers about potential health risks associated with electronic cigarettes.

Also known as "e-cigarettes," electronic cigarettes are battery-operated devices designed to look like and be used in the same manner as conventional cigarettes.

Sold online and in many shopping malls, the devices generally contain cartridges filled with nicotine, flavor and other chemicals. They turn nicotine, which is highly addictive, and other chemicals into a vapor that is inhaled by the user.

Continue reading "FDA Warns of E-Cigarette Risks" »

A WV Kanawha County woman has filed a lawsuit against the makers of popular weight-loss product Hydroxycut, alleging that they falsely marketed their products as safe and effective dietary supplements.

In a suit filed last week in Kanawha Circuit Court, Rhonda M. Hawkins maintains that Ontario-based Iovate Health Sciences, Inc., and its subsidiaries and related companies defrauded the public by advertising that Hydroxycut products worked and had no adverse health effects.

Continue reading "Hydroxycut Law Suit Filed in WV Against Iovate" »

With thousands of homeowners claiming their houses and health are deteriorating from sulfur-emitting Chinese drywall, a federal judge in New Orleans is intent on fast-tracking a handful of cases for trial, attorneys say.

The first of these bellwether lawsuits could be tried by the end of the year, a timetable that encourages homeowners to think settlement. In contrast, drywall maker and defendant Knauf Plasterboard Tianjin welcomes home inspections and is investigating "practical solutions" but denies any health effects from its drywall.

About 600 tainted Chinese drywall lawsuits have been consolidated in multidistrict litigation under U.S. District Judge Eldon E. Fallon for pretrial issues. With the help of plaintiff and defense steering committees, Fallon will select five cases to test the waters.

"He is moving extremely fast, which is the right thing because people are living in homes that are toxic to them," said Victor Diaz, a partner at Podhurst Orseck in Miami and a member of the MDL plaintiff steering committee.

Continue reading "Defective Product Chinese Drywall Cases on 'Rocket Docket'" »

Merck & Co., the drugmaker facing 900 lawsuits over claims that its osteoporosis drug Fosamax causes the death of jawbone tissue, goes to trial tomorrow in a case that may affect all the others.

The trial in New York of the first case of the group, filed by Shirley Boles, 71, will be one of three so-called bellwether cases that may point the way to out-of-court settlements.

Continue reading "Merck Faces First Trial of Claim That Fosamax Attacks Jawbone " »

As investigators with the Consumer Product Safety Commission prepared for a visit to China next week to look into tainted drywall, the federal judge overseeing the massive basket of legal cases reiterated his plan to speed the proceedings along.

In a report to Congress, the federal agency -- leading the investigation into Chinese drywall -- said it had received permission from Chinese officials for the trip, scheduled to begin on Monday.

Meanwhile, Judge Eldon E. Fallon, who plans to begin "bellwether" trials in January, told both sides during a status conference in New Orleans on Tuesday that he expected discovery to begin in a few weeks.

The process will be sped along by the use of "profile forms" rather than traditional interrogatories that can get mired in procedural delays.

Fallon also said he wanted an agreed-upon plan for inspecting and identifying affected homes by Friday. The inspections should determine whether a home had Chinese drywall and, if so, what kind of damage was present, Fallon said.

Continue reading "Speedy Chinese Drywall Litigation Given Thumbs up" »

Merck & Co., the drugmaker facing 900 lawsuits over claims that its osteoporosis drug Fosamax causes the death of jawbone tissue, goes to trial tomorrow in a case that may affect all the others.

The trial in New York of the first case of the group, filed by Shirley Boles, 71, will be one of three so-called bellwether cases that may point the way to out-of-court settlements.

“In mass litigation, all eyes are on the first trial, not only because it shows the strategy of each side, but also because it’s the first information about how jurors respond to the evidence,” said Howard Erichson, a law professor at Fordham University in New York and an expert on civil procedure.

Continue reading "Merck Faces Product Liablity Claim That Fosamax Attacks Jawbone " »

Yaz and Yasmin are different from other combination birth control pills because they both contain a new type of progestin hormone known as drsp or drospirenone.

However, drospirenone has diuretic activity that can cause an increase in the user’s potassium levels, which can lead to dangerous health problems and is especially dangerous to users who have pre-existing kidney, liver and adrenal disease.

Continue reading "Yaz Yasmin and Drospirenone Side Effects" »

A federal appeals court has invalidated Bayer’s patent for the birth control pill Yasmin, allowing Teva Pharmaceuticals to produce the generic version, Ocella, without licensing the drug.

The U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court’s finding that the use of the progestin drospirenone that led to Yasmin were too obvious a pharmaceutical development for Bayer to patent.

Yasmin is an oral contraceptive that combines drospirenone with the estrogen component ethinyl estriadol to prohibit ovulation. While many birth control pills use ethinyl estriadol in combination with progestins, Yasmin was the first to use drospirenone.

Continue reading "Yasmin Generic Lawsuit Knocks out Bayer's Patent over Birth Control Pill" »

A Texas law firm is targeting generic drug giant Mylan Inc., along with other pharmaceutical companies, in product liability lawsuits related to the manufacture of pain patches.

The lawsuits involve the powerful painkiller fentanyl, which is applied to the skin in a patch for the slow release of the medication. In the Mylan lawsuits, the plaintiffs attribute 28 deaths to the patches.

Mylan makes the patches at its plant in St. Albans, Vt., which is operated by Mylan subsidiary Mylan Technologies Inc.

“We think there was a manufacturer defect,” according to the plaintiffs' attorney. “What we don’t know is the exact nature of the defect.”

Mylan has denied liability in court filings.

Continue reading "Mylan Faces Several Product Liability Lawsuits Over Fentanyl Pain Patches" »

An expert panel reported that two more diseases may be linked to exposure to Agent Orange, a defoliant used by the American military during the Vietnam War.

People exposed to the chemical appear, at least tentatively, to be more likely to develop Parkinson’s disease and ischemic heart disease, according to the report. The report was written by a 14-member committee charged by the Institute of Medicine with determining whether certain medical conditions were caused by exposure to herbicides used to clear stretches of jungle.

The results, though not conclusive, are an important first step for veterans groups working to get the government to help pay for treatment of illnesses they believe have roots on the battlefield. Some other conditions linked to Agent Orange already qualify.

Continue reading "Parkinson Disease and Heart Disease linked to Agent Orange" »

Pfizer Inc.’s Warner-Lambert unit created a list of 13 ailments that its epilepsy medicine Neurontin could treat as part of its promotion of the drug for unapproved uses, a former employee testified.

“I was trained from day one” to market the drug illegally, David Franklin testified. Franklin, who worked as a medical liaison at the Parke-Davis division of Warner-Lambert, said he encouraged doctors to prescribe Neurontin for uses beyond those approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

“My job was to promote Neurontin and motivate doctors to experiment” on patients, he said today in federal court in Boston. After being hired as a medical liaison, “I was selling drugs,” he said. The uses promoted were from the “snake-oil list” of 13 medical conditions, said Franklin, a microbiologist.

Continue reading "Defective Drugs: Neurontin Lawsuits and Suicide" »

Federal regulators on Tuesday added stronger warnings to a group of best-selling drugs used to treat arthritis and other inflammatory diseases, saying they can increase the risk of cancer in children and adolescents.

After more than a year of review, Food and Drug Administration scientists said the drugs appear to increase the risk of cancer after they are used beyond 2 1/2 years. The agency studied several dozen reports of cancer in children taking the drugs, some of which were fatal. Half of the cases were lymphomas, a cancer that attacks the immune system.

The drugs are known as tumor necrosis factor blockers and work by neutralizing a protein that, when overproduced, causes inflammation and damage to bones, cartilage and other tissue. The drugs are prescribed to children with rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disorder and Crohn's disease.

Continue reading "FDA: Arthritis Drugs Linked to Cancer Risk in children" »

Merck & Co., facing more than 850 lawsuits over claims that its osteoporosis drug Fosamax may cause irreversible “jaw rot,” won’t face punitive damages in the first trial, a federal judge said.

U.S. District Judge John Keenan said at a hearing today in New York that he’ll release a decision as early as July 31 knocking out the possibility of punitive damages in the case. He’ll deny Merck’s request to rule in its favor on liability, which means the case will go to trial Aug. 11, he said.

Keenan has scheduled three so-called bellwether trials through January to show each side the other’s strategy and possibly point the way to settlements. The judge earlier denied the plaintiffs’ request to treat the litigation as a class, or group, lawsuit allowing them to ask for court-ordered medical monitoring of all Fosamax users.

Continue reading "No Punitive Damages Against Merck in Fosamax Trial" »

The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday released an analysis of 19 varieties of electronic cigarettes that said half contained nitrosamines (the same carcinogen found in real cigarettes) and many contained diethylene glycol, the poisonous ingredient in antifreeze. Some that claimed to have no nicotine were found to have low levels of the drug.

E-cigarettes are promoted by their manufacturers as safer than traditional cigarettes because they do not burn tobacco. Instead, a lithium battery in the cigarette-shaped device heats a solution of nicotine in propylene glycol, producing a fine mist that can be inhaled to deliver nicotine directly to the lungs.

Continue reading "Carcinogens and Poisons Found in Electronic Cigarettes" »

After her family dropped its lawsuit in the midst of trial, Pfizer Inc. won’t face a lawsuit over claims its epilepsy drug Neurontin helped lead a Massachusetts woman to commit suicide,

Susan Bulger’s family agreed to dismiss the suit after an anonymous donor offered to put money in a trust for her 10-year- old daughter, Regina, said Mark Lanier, the family’s lawyer. The trial began July 27 and was scheduled to run three weeks in federal court in Boston.

The suit was the first of about 1,200 involving Neurontin. The family claimed Pfizer, the world’s largest drug company, promoted the medication for unapproved uses and didn’t warn it could increase the risk of suicide until forced to do so by the government. Pfizer said Bulger had a history of drug abuse and had made six suicide attempts before taking her life in 2004.

Continue reading "Neurontin Pfizer Product Liability Lawsuit Dropped" »

The drug Metoclopramide (brand name Reglan, Octamide, Maxolon ) which is used to treat some gastrointestinal disorders such as gastro-esophageal reflux disease (GERD), diabetic gastroparesis and nausea has been linked to the serious neurological movement disorder known as tardive dyskinesia.

On February 26, 2009 the FDA issued an alert warning against chronic use of metoclopramide containing drugs and requiring a boxed warning.

Reglan side effects of tardive dyskinesia and drug induced movement disorders are characterized by rarely reversible symptoms that include random movements in the tongue, lips or jaw as well as facial grimacing, movements of arms, legs, fingers and toes along with swaying movements of the trunk or hip.

Continue reading "Defective Drugs: Reglan Lawsuits and Tardive Dyskinesia" »

The asbestos lawsuits filed in the United States over the past fifty years constitute the longest running mass tort in the country’s history. A tort is defined as a civil action taken based on a negligent or intentional harm done that is not based on contract law.

A Rand Corporation research says that by the end of 2002, about 730,000 individuals claiming physical harm from asbestos exposure had filed suit against about 8,400 corporations and businesses. At that point, about seventy corporations had filed for bankruptcy protection over their asbestos liability.

Today, in 2009 the number of bankruptcy filings has reached one hundred. The number of lawsuits since 2002 are several hundred thousand in number and they have increased each year. Because the diseases caused by asbestos exposure have latency periods of up to fifty years, many people who were exposed to asbestos decades ago are just now getting sick.

Continue reading "Arlington Texas Asbestos Litigation" »

The central figure of an investigation into the hepatitis C outbreak might have been impaired by a stroke a year ago, but he is competent enough to face medical malpractice charges, according to the state Board of Medical Examiners.

Based on results from an examination performed by Dr. Thomas Kinsora, a clinical neuropsychologist, Dr. Dipak Desai is "borderline" in regards to his ability to assist defense attorneys in his medical board licensing hearing.

Continue reading "Hepatitis C Medical Malpractice Claims Can Proceed" »

Yasmin lawsuits are personal injury cases that seek settlements for women injured after taking Yasmin (drospirenone), a contraceptive pill also prescribed in the treatment of moderate acne and premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) for menstruating women. Yasmin may also be sold under the brand name Yaz, a form of drospirenone manufactured and distributed by Bayer.

Produced by Berlex Laboratories, Inc., Yasmin has been reported to cause a variety of serious side effects since its FDA approval in May 2001. Women injured after taking Yasmin will likely be entitled to compensation by pursuing a Yasmin lawsuit.

Continue reading "Defective Drug: Yasmin Lawsuits" »

Patients who were harmed because of heparin contamination still have time to bring claims against the makers of the heparin products. Patients may have been exposed to contaminated heparin through injections, pre-filled syringes or IV bags. It is important for people affected by contaminated heparin to hold those responsible accountable for what happened.

Heparin is a blood thinner, used in a variety of procedures, including dialysis and cardiac procedures. In early 2008, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a recall of certain Baxter heparin products after the agency received reports of adverse reactions linked to the products. Within a month, hundreds of reports detailing severe reactions to heparin surfaced worldwide. The recall was later expanded to include more products and other companies.

The FDA discovered that the contaminant was oversulfated chondroitin sulphate (OSCS), the reactions to OSCS can be extreme; with large doses of heparin, it can result in death.

Injuries linked to contaminated heparin include nausea, vomiting and flu-like symptoms to anaphylactic shock, coma and even death.

Continue reading "Baxter Contaminated Heparin Class Action Lawsuit Still Open" »

Federal regulators warned consumers on Tuesday not to use body-building products that are sold as nutritional supplements but may contain steroids or steroidlike substances, citing reports of acute liver injury and kidney failure.

The Food and Drug Administration said it issued the warning because of increased reports of medical problems in men who had used such products.

But except for naming eight specific supplements sold by a single company, the Food and Drug Administration did not provide much clear guidance to consumers on what other products to avoid. The F.D.A. acknowledged that it did not know how many products its warning affect

Continue reading "FDA Warns Against Bodybuilding Products Containing Steroids" »

Accutane has been a controversial acne medication because of the serious risk of side effects and suicides attributed to it. The FDA warned physicians prescribing the acne medication to be aware of any signs of depression their patients might display. Accutane manufacturer Hoffman-LaRoche did not warn patients and healthcare professionals of the potential risks involved with Accutane until after the FDA made this advisement.

In October 2001, Congressman Bart Stupak expressed his concerns about Accutane following the suicide of his son who was taking Accutane. Accutane manufacturer has warned physicians that the acne drug can possibly cause "depression, psychotic symptoms, and rarely suicide attempts," but still the company maintains they believe the drug is safe. In addition, Accutane carries high risk of serious birth defects, including deformed babies, miscarriage, premature birth, or death of the baby.

Continue reading "Defective Drug: Accutane Lawsuits and Inflammatory Bowel Disease" »

If you took an oral sodium phosphate (OSP) to clean your bowels prior to a colonoscopy and have developed kidney damage, there is a chance your health problems are linked to the use of the OSP. In 2008, certain oral sodium phosphates, including OsmoPrep and Visicol were given a black box warning, the highest warning required by the FDA, alerting patients to the risk of kidney damage.

The OsmoPrep and the Visicol are prescription drugs, and there is also an over-the-counter preparation called a Fleet enema. These also have been linked with acute kidney damage when used as bowel preparation for a colonoscopy but not when used as a laxative. In 2008, they were also given a black box warning that warns of the potential risks of renal failure."

There are some people who are more susceptible to renal failure than others. Some factors that can affect a patient's susceptibility include having pre-existing kidney damage, being dehydrated while taking the OSP, being on an angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor while taking the OSP, being on an angiotensin receptor blocker (ARB) while taking the OSP, having increased bowel transit times (such as a bowel obstruction or colitis), or being on a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) while taking the OSP. A final risk factor is being 55 years of age or older at the time the OSP is taken.

Continue reading "Fleet Phospate Class Action Lawsuits For Kidney Damage" »

If you are a patient taking Avandia and have suffered a heart attack or stroke, you need to seek legal advice as the time for filing a lawsuit may be running out, . Avandia is used to treat type 2 diabetes mellitus but studies have linked Avandia to an increased risk of adverse heart events.

Avandia was found to have an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes, the problems it causes are similar to those caused by Vioxx. Avandia is believed to increase a certain subset of cholesterol that also increases the risk of heart attacks.

The FDA issued a safety alert in May, 2007, based on different studies, and found that people with underlying heart disease are at an increased risk of one of those events [heart attack or stroke] if they are taking Avandia. There was a meta-analysis, where researchers looked at different studies, and that showed a 30 to 40 percent greater risk of a heart attack in patients treated with Avandia than people treated with a placebo or other diabetes therapies.

Continue reading "Avandia Class Action Lawsuits and Increased Risk of Strokes" »

Introduced in the U.S. in July 2002, NuvaRing is a vaginal contraceptive ring that is over 98 percent effective at preventing pregnancy when it is used properly.

NuvaRing birth control works over the course of three weeks by slowly releasing hormones into a woman's body. While NuvaRing needs to be removed during the fourth week of a month (to allow for menstruation), the contraceptive effects of this birth control device continue to persist.

Currently, over 1.5 million women in 32 countries, including the U.S., the Netherlands and Australia, use NuvaRing.

Continue reading "Defective Drug: Nuvaring Lawsuits and Increased Risk of Stroke" »

According to adverse drug event reports received by the FDA, there may be a connection between the use of Chantix and diabetes. The drug has been linked with a number of reports involving new onset diabetes.

The Chantix attorneys at Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm are evaluating the potential for legal cases on behalf of individuals who were diagnosed with diabetes for the first time after using Chantix.

While studies have not firmly established that Chantix causes diabetes, sufficient reports of problems associated with the use of the drug warrant further investigation. Potential cases are being reviewed throughout the United States.

Continue reading "Chantix Diabetes Side Effects and Lawsuits" »

The use of oral sodium phosphate products, like Fleet Phospho-soda, Visicol and OsmoPrep, to clear out the bowels before a colonoscopy or other medical procedure, have been associated with the development of a rare but serious form of kidney injury known as acute phosphate nephropathy.

The Fleet Phospho-soda attorneys at Dr Shezad Malik Law Firm are investigating potential Acute Phosphate Nephropathy lawsuits for patients who have been diagnosed with the kidney condition after using an over-the-counter Fleet Phospho-soda laxative at high doses for colonoscopy prep.

Continue reading "Fleet Phospho-soda and Acute Phosphate Nephropathy Lawsuits" »

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has caught the manufacturers of Zicam and that should force it, to regulate homeopathic products.

FDA regulations require that drugs and treatments be “scientifically proven safe and effective.” Homeopathic remedies, except when people rely on them to treat serious conditions, are usually safe. So far, though, the FDA has ignored the multi-million dollar fraud. But now there is harm.

Continue reading "Zicam Lawsuits and the FDA Complaint" »

An investor with Matrixx Initiatives, Inc. the maker of Zicam, has filed a proposed securities class action lawsuit in the United States District Court for the District of Arizona on behalf of shareholders of Matrixx Initiatives, Inc., who purchased Matrixx stock between December 22, 2007 and June 15, 2009, in relation to Matrixx Initiatives alleged violations of FDA regulations involving the Zicam Cold Remedy products.

Continue reading "Zicam Matrixx Initiatives, Inc. Investor Class Action Lawsuit" »

Millions of people who have used the prescription acne medication call it a miracle. But the drug also has been the target of lawsuits, federal investigations and scientists who say the drug is overused and that its dangers outweigh its benefits.

But now Accutane is gone. Its maker, Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche Holding, pulled it from the market last week. The company maintains the drug is safe but says it can't compete with generic versions that flooded the U.S. market several years ago.

Others say Roche has had trouble shaking off the studies and lawsuits that link it to everything from birth defects to depression. Juries recently awarded at least $33 million in damages to users who blamed the drug for bowel disorders.

"We've never advocated this drug being taken off the market," said Dr. Sidney Wolfe of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group that has been vocal about Accutane.

Click here for the Accutane Case List

Continue reading "Accutane Lawsuits and Litigation" »

Beverly Crouch spent hundreds of dollars on chemicals last fall to try to get the green tinge out of her backyard pool.

It wasn't until two months ago that she learned why the chemicals she put into her 13,000-gallon, above-ground pool wouldn't clear the water. The green color came from well water contaminated with hexavalent chromium, a known human carcinogen.

Crouch, 44, isn't alone. Some of her neighbors' wells gushed water the color of urine.

Texas environmental officials are still trying to determine the extent of the contamination. Later this month, they will ask the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to consider the site for federal Superfund status.

After that, efforts will begin to find who dumped the dangerous chemical, which appears to have been in the area for years, according to one environmental investigator.

Continue reading "Midland Texas Wells Contaminated with Chromium" »

U.S. District Judge Cecilia M. Altonaga, who is handling the consolidated Fixodent and Super PoliGrip lawsuits filed over zinc poisoning from denture creams, issued an order designating lawyers to serve in leadership positions in the MDL, or Multidistrict litigation. These denture cream lawyers will perform services that benefit all of the plaintiffs involved in the litigation during the pretrial proceedings.

On June 9, 2009, the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation centralized all federal denture cream lawsuits before Judge Altonaga in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, for coordinated discovery and pretrial litigation.

Continue reading "Denture Cream Lawsuits" »

MedWatch June 2009 Drug Safety Labeling Changes posting includes 31 drug products with safety labeling changes to the following sections: BOXED WARNING, CONTRAINDICATIONS, WARNINGS, PRECAUTIONS, ADVERSE REACTIONS, PATIENT PACKAGE INSERT, and MEDICATION GUIDE.

The "Summary Page" provides a listing of drug names and safety labeling sections revised:

Continue reading "FDA Safety Information and Adverse Event Reporting Program" »

A Rhode Island woman has joined 516 other plaintiffs in a massive lawsuit against pharmaceutical companies that make certain dyes used for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

The woman, who did not want to be identified, was diagnosed with nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NSF) in 2006 after being injected with a contrast-agent made with gadolinium . It's a rare disease that affects people with renal failure, such as kidney disease.

The contrast-agent, or dye, is used during an MRI to help technicians and doctors examine tissue. Patients with healthy kidneys simply flush the gadolinium out. People diagnosed with NSF, however, describe their skin turning wood-like, eventually cracking. The disease can move to organs where it can be fatal.

Continue reading "Gadolinium MRI Dye Linked to Skin Disease" »

Russell Powell wondered for years after he returned from Iraq why he couldn't run even short distances without wheezing.

Following his yearlong tour of duty that ended in 2004, he coached his son's Little League team, but had to stop because it exhausted him.

The 34-year-old, who was able to run two miles in 9:44 before he went to Iraq in 2003, said now he is lucky to finish in 20 minutes.

He was discharged from the West Virginia Army National Guard for medical reasons at the end of 2008 because he was unable to meet physical requirements. Since he started his new job as a corrections officer for a West Virginia prison earlier this year, he's had to use several sick days and vacation days to visit doctors.

Continue reading "W. Va. Soldiers sue KBR for Chemical Exposure in Iraq " »

Two years after several environmental groups sued, a Houston energy company has agreed to clean up mercury contamination around its natural gas wells in the Monroe area.

EnerVest Operating LLC will decontaminate land in Ouachita, Union and Morehouse parishes and replace about 400 leaky mercury meters the company uses to gauge well and pipeline pressure, according to a settlement approved last week by the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.

The deal comes more than two years after EnerVest was sued for allowing mercury to seep into the land surrounding its wells in northeast Louisiana. The company failed to properly dispose of mercury and clean up spills from meters, according to the lawsuit filed by the Louisiana Audubon Council, the Sierra Club, the Gulf Restoration Network and the Louisiana Environmental Action Network. Nor did EnerVest upgrade its meters to more environmentally friendly models that have become "the industry standard," the groups said.

Continue reading "Texas Firm Agrees to Clean up Mercury Spills to Settle Lawsuit" »

Has a Zicam nasal cold remedy robbed you of your sense of smell, and possibly the ability to taste? If so you have probably been stricken with a condition called anosmia – loss of sense of smell, sometimes accompanied by loss of sense of taste - related to the presence of zinc gluconate in Zicam intranasal cold remedies. Like thousands of other people who have used Zicam nasal gel or swabs, you probably had no idea that these products could be so dangerous.

Matrixx Initiatives, Inc. has had to remove several varieties of Zicam nasal cold remedies from the market because of their association with anosmia. The lawyers at our firm are currently representing scores of people in personal injury lawsuits who lost their ability to smell, and in some cases taste, after using a Zicam nasal gel or swab to treat or prevent a cold.

Continue reading "Zicam Lawsuit and the FDA" »

Federal and state officials plan to interview about 100 Midlothian residents next week as part of an environmental study to see whether a link exists between industrial pollution and human and animal health problems, including birth defects.

Midlothian, southeast of Fort Worth, has 10 cement kilns, one of the largest concentrations in the country and a major source of industrial pollution in North Texas, according to environmental groups. Residents also worry about emissions from a steel plant in this community of about 15,000.

Continue reading "Midlothian Texas Residents to be Studied for Industrial Pollution" »

Side effects of Zicam Nasal Gel and Nasal Swabs, marketed as an over-the-counter cold remedy, have been associated with the loss of sense of smell and taste, which can be an extremely devastating injury. In June 2009, the FDA required that three Zicam Cold Remedy products be pulled from the market due to reports of more than 130 users losing their sense of smell.

STATUS OF ZICAM LAWSUITS: Hundreds of Zicam lawsuits have been filed on behalf of individuals who lost their sense of taste or smell, and lawyers are continuing to review potential claims.

Continue reading "Zicam Lawsuit Filed" »

Roche Holding AG, the world’s biggest maker of cancer drugs, is pulling its Accutane acne medicine from the U.S. market after juries awarded at least $33 million in damages to users who blamed the drug for bowel disease.

Roche notified the U.S. Food and Drug Administration today that it was withdrawing Accutane after a “reevaluation” of its product lines showed it faced serious challenges from generic competitors, company officials said in a statement.

“In addition, Roche has been faced with high costs from personal-injury lawsuits that the company continues to defend vigorously,” according to the statement.

About 13 million people have taken Accutane since it went on the market in 1982. The medication was Roche’s second-biggest selling drug before the patent expired in 2002 and rivals started selling generic versions. Roche’s prescription market share of the drug is now below 5 percent, the company said.

Continue reading "Roche Pulls Accutane Off Market After Jury Verdicts" »

In Texas, Asbestos been used in the petroleum industry in everything from pipe insulation to gaskets to the clothes workers wore. Asbestos causes cancer when breathed into the lungs, often in the form of Mesothelioma.

The fire benefits of asbestos were such that their use in Texas did not stop with the petroleum industry. The substance was used in building materials for homes, schools and buildings.

The state of Texas is in the top 10 when it comes to asbestos claims. At last count, it was placed seventh among all the states for the highest number of asbestos lawsuits filed and that number is expected to rise dramatically as the disease progresses.

Continue reading "Texas Asbestos Lung Mesothelioma Lawsuits" »

FDA has required the manufacturers of the smoking cessation aids varenicline (Chantix) and bupropion (Zyban and generics) to add new Boxed Warnings and develop patient Medication Guides highlighting the risk of serious neuropsychiatric symptoms in patients using these products. These symptoms include changes in behavior, hostility, agitation, depressed mood, suicidal thoughts and behavior, and attempted suicide. The same changes to the prescribing information and Medication Guide for patients will also be required for bupropion products (Wellbutrin and generics)that are indicated for the treatment of depression and seasonal affective disorder.

Continue reading "FDA: Varenicline (marketed as Chantix) and Bupropion (marketed as Zyban, Wellbutrin, and generics)" »

The Yaz® birth control pill has been on the market since 2006. Yaz is taken orally once daily to prevent pregnancy.

Yaz differs from other birth control methods because it contains a progestin hormone called drospirenone, which can increase potassium levels in the bloodstream.

Yaz has been linked with serious adverse heart problems. In a letter sent to the manufacturer of Yaz, the Food and Drug Administration warns of blood clots, heart attack, stroke, and gall bladder disease in Yaz users.

The FDA says, "Yaz has additional risks because it contains the progestin, drospirenone which can lead to hyperkalemia in high risk patients, which may result in potentially serious heart and health problems. Women taking Yaz must be concerned about the drug interactions that could increase potassium, in addition to the drug interactions common to all combination oral contraceptives."

Continue reading "Yaz Class Action Law Suits in Progress" »

Ever since the issue of MRI health risks began circulating, Gadolinium kidney failure has been debated—especially with its link to nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NSF) and increased risk for MRI and kidney failure when used in association with MRI for persons with compromised kidneys.

However, a new study casts a certain amount of doubt. The study: High-Dose Gadodiamide for Catheter Angiography and CT in Patients With Varying Degrees of Renal Insufficiency: Prevalence of Subsequent Nephrogenic Systemic Fibrosis and Decline in Renal Function, was recently undertaken at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida.

The results of the study were published in the American Journal of Roentgenology.

"The purpose of our study was to evaluate the prevalence of nephrogenic systemic fibrosis and nephrotoxicity among patients with differing degrees of renal dysfunction who are exposed to high doses of gadodiamide," said Mellena D. Bridges, MD, lead author of the study.

Continue reading "MRI Gadolinium Induced Kidney Failure" »

A federal judge in Atlanta is permitting dozens of product liability suits against Home Depot and the makers of a tile grout cleaner to proceed to trial on negligence claims, but he has stripped away other claims that sought damages for violating federal consumer product safety laws.

Ten of those suits, filed by an Atlanta attorney on behalf of Home Depot customers who were hospitalized after using Tile Perfect Stand 'N Seal Spray-On Grout Cleaner, are among approximately 50 suits that have settled, according to a Home Depot attorney. The settlements are confidential, said Frank A. Ilardi of Houck, Ilardi & Regas, who shared lead counsel duties with Texas attorney William J. Maiberger Jr. until Ilardi negotiated the settlements.

Continue reading "Home Depot Product Liability Suits Advances" »

There is a big mess at Matrixx Initiatives, a Scottsdale, Ariz., maker of over-the-counter health care products. Best-known for its homeopathic Zicam Cold Remedy offerings, Matrixx hit a rough patch on June 16, when the Food and Drug Administration advised consumers to stop using two of its popular remedies.

The F.D.A. said that it had received more than 130 reports of anosmia — or loss of smell — from users of the products and that more than 800 such reports had been delivered to Matrixx. The agency told Matrixx that Zicam Cold Remedy Nasal Gel and the same treatment in swab form could no longer be marketed without government approval.

Continue reading "Zicam and Shareholder Litigation Begins" »

Roche Holding AG, the world’s biggest maker of cancer drugs, is pulling its Accutane acne medicine from the U.S. market after juries awarded at least $33 million in damages to users who blamed the drug for bowel disease.

Roche notified the U.S. Food and Drug Administration today that it was withdrawing Accutane after a “reevaluation” of its product lines showed it faced serious challenges from generic competitors, company officials said in a statement.

“In addition, Roche has been faced with high costs from personal-injury lawsuits that the company continues to defend vigorously,” according to the statement.

Continue reading "Roche Pulls Accutane Off Market After Jury Verdicts " »

In what could be the opening salvo in a new wave of lawsuits against the Scottsdale-based maker of Zicam, lawyers filed a lawsuit on behalf of 117 people who claim they have suffered loss of smell after using the popular nasal spray.

Among those suing Scottsdale-based Matrixx Initiatives Inc. include one dozen Phoenix-area residents as well as the chef of an upscale Las Vegas-area restaurant who no longer can smell or taste food.

Matrixx officials said they had not seen the lawsuit filed in Maricopa County Superior Court, but a spokesman said the company believes that its nasal products are safe and do not cause loss of smell.

Continue reading "Zicam Lawsuit Filed" »