A drug designed to fight anemia appears to double the risk of stroke in patients with diabetes and kidney disease without substantially improving their quality of life, a new study finds. Darbepoetin alfa, marketed as Aranesp and known as an erythropoiesis-stimulating agent (ESA), is often prescribed for diabetic patients with…
The widow of a LA firefighter who was killed last year while on duty has sued the fire department and the city for allegedly causing his death by refusing to replace outdated equipment. Ralph Arabie, a 30-year veteran of the David Crockett Steam Fire Company No. 1, was killed in…
The pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca said that it had reached a $520 million agreement to settle two federal investigations and two whistle-blower lawsuits over the sale and marketing of its blockbuster psychiatric drug Seroquel. One of the investigations related to “selected physicians who participated in clinical trials involving Seroquel,” AstraZeneca disclosed…
A Marin County supermarket clerk who urinated on herself at the checkout counter after her supervisor refused to let her take a bathroom break is entitled to a $200,000 damage award, a state appeals court has ruled. The woman, identified only as A.M., had returned to work at an Albertson’s…
More than 200 patients exposed to high levels of radiation at Cedars-Sinai hospital filed suit, and attorneys say more plaintiffs could be added as word of the lawsuit spreads. The president of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center – where patients were recently exposed to eight times the recommended radiation after undergoing brain…
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…
Trial is set to begin in Michigan in a lawsuit that claims a company is liable for three deaths caused by a company employee who was driving drunk. Thomas Wellinger, who had been sent from his office at UGS Corp. to seek medical attention, drove his vehicle at 70 mph…
Three federal agencies — the Food and Drug Administration, the Defense Department and the National Eye Institute — announced last week that they are launching a three-year effort to gauge how many, and which, patients suffer troubling symptoms after undergoing the vision correction procedure called Lasik. At the same time,…
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…
A Pfizer Inc. unit must pay an undisclosed amount of punitive damages to an Illinois woman who developed breast cancer after taking one of the drugmaker’s menopause treatments, according to a Philadelphia jury. Jurors deliberated 25 minutes before finding Pfizer’s Wyeth subsidiary was responsible for paying an award to Connie…