Dallas Fort Worth Injury Lawyer Blog

July 19, 2010

Doctors Say It’s Already Over For Diabetes Drug Avandia

In treating diabetes, it might not matter much whether the Food and Drug Administration halts sales of the drug Avandia.

An FDA committee of outside experts met last week to provide advice on whether any regulatory action — from stronger warnings to removal — is needed. The FDA has the final say on the committee’s recommendations and could decide within weeks.

Doctors already have given their verdict. Avandia prescriptions have plummeted since a study in The New England Journal of Medicine in May 2007 raised concerns about whether the drug increased heart attack risk.

Rule the full story here.

July 19, 2010

Texas Doctor Who Fought Nurses’ Grievances Faces TMB Complaint

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The trouble started in April 2009, when nurses, Anne Mitchell and Vickilyn Galle, sent an unsigned letter to the Texas Medical Board outlining concerns about Dr. Rolando G. Arafiles Jr., including his alleged use of herbal remedies and attempt to use hospital supplies to perform at-home procedures.

Arafiles filed a harassment complaint with county officials, and the nurses were charged criminally with felony misuse of official information and fired from their jobs at Winkler County Memorial Hospital.

Now, the medical board has filed a complaint alleging Arafiles used “poor medical judgment” and “poor decision-making,” overbilled patients, prescribed nontherapeutic treatments and intimidated witnesses. Betsy Blaney, Associated Press, The Dallas Morning News 07/19/2010

Read Article: The Dallas Morning News

July 19, 2010

Driver and Caltrans, Responsible For Car Accident

by Dr. Shezad Malik

A San Mateo County jury has ordered Caltrans and a northern California woman to pay $12.2 million to a 21-year-old girl who suffered permanent brain damage during a car accident in 2006.

Gada Hassan hit Emily Liou with her car while Liou was crossing the street at a cross walk at the top of a small rise in the road.

The lawyers for the plaintiff argued also that Caltrans was responsible because they had done nothing to ensure the safety of pedestrians and drivers at that intersection, which has seen three similarly fatal accidents since 1991. Joshua Melvin, San Jose Mercury News 07/14/2010

Read the article here.

July 18, 2010

Dallas Texas Update: Pain Pumps & Arthoscopic Shoulder Surgery Risks

by Dr. Shezad Malik

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.

July 18, 2010

GSK to Take Charge of $2.36B Related to Paxil, Avandia.

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The New York Times (7/16, B2, Jolly, Harris) reports that UK pharmaceutical maker GlaxoSmithKline announced on July 15 that “it would take a second-quarter charge of $2.36 billion related to legal cases involving its drugs Avandia [rosiglitazone] and Paxil [paroxetine].”

This announcement comes one “day after an American medical advisory panel recommended that Avandia, a controversial diabetes drug, should either be withdrawn from the market or be severely restricted in its sales because it increases the risks of heart attacks.” According to GSK, “the charge announced Thursday, which will amount to about $2.1 billion after taxes, ‘includes provisioning for settled cases and an estimate for those cases which we have received and are still outstanding.'”

Read the full story here.

July 18, 2010

Natural Gas Company’s Natural Gas Disclosure Decision Could Change Fracking

by Dr. Shezad Malik

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

July 17, 2010

FDA: Avandia To Be Restricted

by Dr. Shezad Malik

An FDA panel has made a recommendation to the agency that the controversial diabetes drug Avandia should either be taken off the market or its sales should be severely restricted.

Avandia and its maker, GlaxoSmithKline, have recently come under fire for trial results that reveal that patients taking Avandia are at an increased risk for heart attacks.

A majority of the committee decided that if Glaxo wants to keep Avandia on the market, it must complete another clinical trial to prove it is safe.

FDA officials said they will consider the recommendations of the committee and make an official decision as soon as possible. Gardiner Harris, The New York Times 07/14/2010
Read Article: The New York Times

July 17, 2010

Imperial Sugar, OSHA Settle Explosion Case

by Dr. Shezad Malik

Sugar Land-based Imperial Sugar has reached a settlement with federal regulators seeking to fine the company for safety violations after a 2008 explosion at its Georgia refinery killed 14 workers near Savannah, GA.

The Feb. 7, 2008, explosion killed 14 workers and injured 36. Investigators determined that dangerous levels of sugar dust accumulated inside the plant and ignited like gunpowder. RUSS BYNUM , AP, Houston Chronicle 07/07/2010
Read Article: Houston Chronicle

July 16, 2010

TXI to Shut Down Highest-Polluting Cement Kilns in Midlothian Texas

by Dr. Shezad Malik

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.

July 14, 2010

Washington High Court Dumps Notice for Malpractice Lawsuits

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The WA Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to require 90 days’ notice before suing a doctor. The court’s 6-3 decision said the waiting period violates the separation of powers between the legislative and judicial branches of government.

The courts already have procedural rules for filing civil suits, and adding a 90-day notice “conflicts with the judiciary’s power to set court procedures,” Justice Charles Johnson wrote for the majority.

The ruling sides with two separate plaintiffs who had medical malpractice cases thrown out by lower courts over notice issues. Those cases were sent back for further action. Associated Press, Seattle Times 07/06/2010
Read Article: Seattle Times