Dallas Fort Worth Injury Lawyer Blog

October 14, 2008

Gadolinium Litigation Involves 391 Lawsuits in State and Federal Court

According to documents filed in federal court, the makers of gadolinium-based contrast agents currently face 391 lawsuits filed by individuals who allege that they developed a rare condition known as NSF, or nephrogenic systemic fibrosis, after an enhanced MRI.

Gadolinium contrast injections are commonly used during MRI and MRA tests to allow doctors to distinguish blood vessels from surrounding tissue by providing enhanced clarity to the images. However, in patients without properly functioning kidneys, side effects of the MRI contrast agents could lead to the hardening and thickening of the skin, which severely restricts movement and could be fatal.

October 14, 2008

Waxahachie Truck Accident Settles For $1.5M

by Dr. Shezad Malik

WAXAHACHIE, TEXAS — An Ellis County jury awarded two men $1.5 million as compensation for injuries they received in an 18-wheeler accident.

The two men were driving northbound on Interstate 35E in Waxahachie when a northbound 18-wheeler banged their car, causing it to roll several times. One of the men received a fractured vertebra and the other man received injury to his right knee, which required several reconstructive surgeries.

October 13, 2008

Utah Medical Malpractice Case Settles for $1M

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The Federal government has agreed to pay a Utah family nearly $1 million to settle a medical malpractice case. The man was being treated for leukemia at the Veterans Affairs hospital in Salt Lake City in 2004 when he developed a severe infection and died. His survivors sued, claiming the hospital failed to give him antibiotics in time. He died of sepsis from a low white-blood-cell count.

The Government agreed to settle the case for $950,000 to cover general damages and future lost income.

October 12, 2008

Botched IV Injection Leads to Amputation

by Dr. Shezad Malik

A Vermont woman was awarded more than $6 million when a jury ordered Wyeth, a pharmaceutical company, to pay her for failing to warn her about the risks of one of its drugs.

But this case was appealed all the way to the US Supreme Court and the Court is set to hear arguments this November.

This case concerns “Federal Pre-emption,” a legal doctrine that can prevent plaintiffs from suing in state court when the products that injured them had met federal standards.

October 11, 2008

Dallas North Tollway Collision

by Dr. Shezad Malik

There was a Dallas North Tollway collision early last Saturday, when a man drove the wrong away. His car collided with two others, killing a female passenger in one of them.

A Dallas police officer noticed a Honda Accord driving north in the southbound lanes of the tollway about 1 a.m. Saturday. The Honda, continued north until near Walnut Hill Lane, where it slammed into a Lexus sedan. The Honda then collided with a Chevrolet pickup. The driver was unhurt.

October 10, 2008

HIV-Aids Origin

by Dr. Shezad Malik

A new study claims that the most common global strain of HIV began spreading in humans around 1900 in sub-Saharan Africa.

This study, which is published in Nature, found that HIV began spreading between 1884 and 1924, around the same time urban centers in west central Africa were established.

Previous studies have shown that HIV spread from chimpanzees to humans in southeastern Cameroon.

October 9, 2008

Nuvaring Birth Control MDL Lawsuit

by Dr. Shezad Malik

United States District Judge Rodney W. Sipple issued an order Wednesday designating lawyers in the recently formed NuvaRing birth control MDL to serve in leadership positions and to act on behalf of all plaintiffs during discovery and pretrial proceedings.

On August 22, 2008, the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation centralized all federal NuvaRing birth control lawsuits in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri before Judge Sipple as part of a federal procedure which allows complex product liability cases to be consolidated and coordinated for pretrial proceedings.

October 9, 2008

Passengers Gambled With Impaired Bus Driver Resulting In Deadly Crash

by Dr. Shezad Malik

California – A bus driver with a history of motor vehicle offenses and substance abuse was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence earlier in the week, hours after his casino-bound charter bus ran into a ditch. Eight people were killed and 30 people were injured.

Officials said the bus had an invalid license plate, and they were unsure whether the driver had proper permits to operate the vehicle. The bus ran off the road while taking passengers to a northern California casino.

AP Photo: A rear view of the charter bus that overturned.

October 8, 2008

Texas Medical Malpractice Fight

by Dr. Shezad Malik

Texas Supreme Court earlier in September, declined to hear a case on whether or not medical malpractice damage caps violate state constitutional rights.

Attorneys for the hospital industry and the Texas Medical Association (TMA) had appealed the issue directly to the Supreme Court, bypassing the court of appeals. The attorneys claim when the Legislature in 2003 approved caps on non-economic damages, it allowed such direct appeals on constitutional questions.

The patient in the district court case had contended that the $250,000 cap violated constitutional provisions such as the right to due process, equal protection and jury trials.

October 7, 2008

New Technologies for Counting Sponges

by Dr. Shezad Malik

Nurses count sponges and surgical instruments when a procedure begins and ends, so that they are not left inside a patient. Cases of retained foreign objects are rare — occurring once in every 5,000 surgeries — discrepancies in counts happen in 13% of surgeries, according to a recent surgical study.

The mistake is one of the hospital-acquired conditions that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will stop paying for as a complicating condition later this year.