Dallas Fort Worth Injury Lawyer Blog

As a Texas medical doctor and Dallas Januvia/Byetta/Victoza dangerous drug Pancreatic Cancer attorney I am providing this latest information and investigation from the FDA.

According to the FDA notice, posted on March 14, the agency is:

“Evaluating unpublished new findings by a group of academic researchers that suggest an increased risk of pancreatitis, or inflammation of the pancreas, and pre-cancerous cellular changes called pancreatic duct metaplasia in patients with type 2 diabetes treated with a class of drugs called incretin mimetics. These findings were based on examination of a small number of pancreatic tissue specimens taken from patients after they died from unspecified causes.”

According to a recent medical study, patients taking the newer diabetes drugs were affected by pancreatic cell growth and damage that may turn cancerous. The study, by UCLA Medical Center, provides evidence of increased pre-cancerous changes in diabetic patients using incretin mimetics drugs such as Januvia, Byetta and Victoza.

FDA Investigates Incretin Mimetics

According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, it was reviewing unpublished data by medical researchers which suggest that pre-cancerous cellular changes may be associated with Type 2 diabetes drugs known as incretin mimetics, including Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Byetta and Novo Nordisk’s Victoza.

The jury finally rendered a verdict today, in a hotly contested Johnson & Johnson defective hip lawsuit, being tried in California state court, Los Angeles. Johnson & Johnson (J&J)’s DePuy subsidiary unit was found liable for defectively designed metal-on-metal hip implant, in the first of 10,750 lawsuits over the device to go to trial.

Jury: Clear Message

The California jury sent a clear message today that Johnson & Johnson and DePuy put profit over safety by awarding Loren Kransky, the plaintiff in the California case of Kransky v. DePuy Orthopedics, $ 8.3 million for damages caused by Mr. Kransky’s implantation and revision of the recalled DePuy ASR XL hip implant.

As a Dallas, Texas Defective Metal on Metal Hip attorney, I have written extensively about the problems and the lawsuits filed against the manufacturers of metal on metal hips. It appears that the problems associated with the metal on metal hips is neither unique or limited to one manufacturer.

Johnson and Johnson’s DePuy ASR and Pinnacle models, Biomet’s M2a Magnum, Stryker Rejuvenate and ABG II models, Wright Conserve, Zimmer Durom cup and Smith and Nephew R3, have all been implicated as being defective, prone to early failure and subjected to revision surgeries.

The most recent recall involving Stryker hips took place quietly on July 4, 2012, while most Americans were busy with fireworks and apple pie.

The first Actos bladder cancer trial is currently underway in Los Angeles, California state court and the trial started February 19th. The plaintiff, Jack Cooper, was diagnosed with bladder cancer after using Actos for more than two years. The case was given a fast track trial date because of Cooper’s terminal condition.

According to the plaintiff, Jack Cooper, Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., the manufacturer of its blockbuster diabetic drug Actos, failed to warn doctors of the cancer risk associated with its diabetes treatment. This is the first of more than 3,000 lawsuits over the drug goes to trial. Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., is Asia’s biggest pharmaceutical company.

Takeda sales representatives never warned Jack Cooper’s doctor in more than 195 visits, according to Cooper’s lawyer Michael Miller in state court in Los Angeles.

I have written extensively about the current trial underway in Los Angeles state court involving the DePuy ASR hip and now I am providing this trial update. According to the plaintiff at the first of 10,750 lawsuits over the recalled hip implant to go to trial, it was Johnson & Johnson’s relentless pursuit of profit that led the multibillion dollar company to sell a defective DePuy ASR metal-on-metal hip that failed faster than any similar device.

Jurors in Los Angeles heard closing arguments that J&J’s DePuy unit defectively designed its ASR hip and failed to warn of the risks. Plaintiff Kransky’s attorney Brian Panish asked for compensatory damages of $5.3 million and punitive damages of as much as $179 million.

Broken Promises and Broken Hearts

Our law firm on behalf of Judy Kay Alexander from Dallas, Texas have filed a defective product liability lawsuit against C.R. Bard over its G2 IVC Filter. Alexander’s lawsuit alleges that C.R. Bard was negligent, failed to warn, produced a defective design and manufacturing, breach of warranty, and negligent misrepresentation.

The complaint was filed on December 19 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Dallas Division. Alexander was implanted with a G2 filter on February 20, 2009, the IVC filter device failed and punctured her inferior vena cava vein and she also suffered damage to her right ureter.

The Bard G2 Filter is an inferior vena cava (IVC) filter used in patients for whom an anticoagulant has been ineffective or is contraindicated. The IVC filter medical device is designed to prevent blood clots from travelling to the lungs from deep vein thrombosis or blood clots usually in the lower legs and causing a pulmonary embolism.