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Locks Law Partner Steven P. Knowlton was recently published in the Philadelphia Business Journal.

Patients in hospitals expect to be competently treated for their medical problems. They expect their broken bones to be mended, their surgeries to be successful, their infections and diseases cured. Parents expect that their children will be made well, and families expect their loved ones pain to be ameliorated. The last thing patients expect is for the hospital to make them sicker, or cause them to die.

But in some hospitals just that seems to be happening, and at an alarming rate. In a study published yesterday in the Archives of Internal Medicine, the authors estimate that 1.7 million patients in American hospitals suffer from a hospital acquired infection each year. Hospital acquired infections are those that the patient gets while in the hospital, during treatment for the disease or medical condition the patient was admitted to the institution for. Additionally, the authors estimate that in 2006, approximately 48, 000 of patients who suffered from hospital acquired infections died as a result. The study revealed that one patient out of every five who developed sepsis died; one patient out of every ten who developed pneumonia also died.

Today, the New Jersey Supreme Court recognized the reality of the globalization of commerce and gave protection to New Jersey residents from injuries caused by products manufactured by foreign manufacturers. In NiCastro v. McIntyre, the Court held that a foreign manufacturer who manufactures a machine that injures a New Jersey resident will be subject to jurisdiction in the state courts of New Jersey if the manufacturer knew or should have known through its distribution scheme that its products were being sold in New Jersey. This is a major victory for the people and manufacturers of New Jersey, for it ensures that foreign companies will not escape having to face their share of responsibility for injuries occurring in New Jersey. Jonathan Miller and Michael Galpern, partners with Locks Law Firm, briefed the appeal on behalf of the Association of Trial Lawyers - New Jersey, now known as the New Jersey Association for Justice. Mr. Miller argued before the Court that it should recognize the reality of globalization, which it did.

Readers of beauty magazines are familiar with the articles and advertisements that feature physicians touting the magical results that come from using various products to correct conditions ranging from cellulite to droopy underarm skin, from yellow teeth to wrinkles. In response to escalating complaints from consumers, the FDA has launched a new effort to rein in the more extravagant claims---especially when the claims involve doctor-pitchmen or pitch-women, and the products are drugs.

The New York Times today reports that in a shot across the beauty and the doctor medical bow, FDA has issued a warning to a well known dermatologist and clinical researcher in Miami Beach alleging that she improperly advocated the use of an as yet unapproved drug she promoted for the treatment of wrinkles. Dr. Leslie Baumann was issued a warning letter advising the doctor that she engaged in promotion of an unapproved drug, which is a violation of FDA policy. Unfortunately, Dr. Baumann is rather the rule than the exception in an industry where media exposure is critical for both the sales of such products and to expand the clientele of the doctors that use them.

Last week a state court jury ruled on the first trial of a shoulder pain pump case anywhere in the country. The jury found in favor of the injured victim, a 38 year old man, in the amount of $5.5 million. The case was Beale v. I-Flow. Mr. Beale suffered from a condition called chondrolysis (loss of cartilage) in his shoulder following the use of a pain pump after routine shoulder surgery. Marc P. Weingarten, a partner in the Philadelphia office of the Locks Law Firm is investigating a large number of these cases and has already filed suit for one client in Massachusetts. If you have had shoulder surgery, and then used a pain pump, and now experience shoulder pain, clicking in the shoulder joint, limited range of motion, or have been diagnosed with chondrolysis, please call Marc at 215.893.3404 or email him at [email protected], to discuss your legal rights.

Those of us who litigate prescription drug cases have always known that the advertizing done by drug companies borders on the fictional, especially in light of the limited oversight that the resource strapped FDA can muster. But now Glaxo, the maker of the over-the-counter fat-blocking drug Alli, has entered into negotiations with the non-profit group Creative Coalition to finance and produce a hard hitting documentary about eating, ostensibly to educate Americans about the causes and dangers of obesity.

The New York Times reports today that the FDA, in a long overdue move, will require stricter test data from the manufacturers of medical devices used in humans. The Agency has long been under fire from Consumer groups and members of Congress who cite increasing problems in recent years with such devices as heart defibrillators, pacemakers and cardiac stents. These groups contend the problems with these devices should have been identified much earlier in the clinical testing phase so they could be remedied, or, at the very least, so doctors and their patients could be properly warned about potential negative effects. Some of these problems have lead to deaths in the patients who have used them. Other patients were required to undergo surgery to remove the defective devices and have them replaced.

In a recent study published Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine several authors propose a new way of monitoring drugs that could increase the margin of safety for consumers. Utilizing internal documents from the Vioxx litigation, Dr. Joseph S. Ross of the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in New York and others set out a method of analyzing clinical studies and post-marketing surveillance data that showed had Merck utilized their method, the cardiovascular risk of Vioxx would have been known two years before Merck withdrew the drug from the US market.

As thousands of Americans descended on the National Mall this past Saturday to protest President Barack Obamas health care agenda, the rallying cry for tort reform was again a popular theme. Who can forget the so-called medical malpractice crisis in New Jersey back in 2004, when hundreds of doctors in their white coats picketed outside the Statehouse in Trenton. Then, as now, the goal was caps on non-economic damages as a proposed solution to out of control health care costs. The prior effort by doctors towards those restrictions failed for the same reason that it should be off the table in the present health care debate- there is no evidence that medical malpractice damages are a significant factor in health care costs.

In my blog post of August 5 I detailed a story about how drug maker Wyeth paid professional, non-physician ghostwriters to formulate articles that were then published by medical journals that doctors read to keep up with the latest changes in medical practice, including new information about prescription drugs. This effort by Wyeth was, of course, to improve doctors opinions about their products so that they would prescribe more Wyeth drugs so that Wyeth would make more money.