Yesterday we mentioned that Merck had won summary judgment in a consumer protection-type suit brought by the Texas Attorney General concerning Vioxx. We hoped for an “interesting opinion.” Well, check that. We’ve now seen the order – and that’s all there is (at least for now) – an order. Here it is, but it doesn’t say much beyond the relief granted.

We couldn’t have done much with it any way, given Bexis’ involvement in (other) Vioxx (more…)

Here’s today’s question: What do we think of McQuiston v. Boston Scientific Corp., No. 5:07-cv-01723-TS-MLH, slip op. (W.D. La. Nov. 19, 2009) (link here)?

Here’s today’s answer: We love it!

But not for the reasons you’d think.

Here’s the deal: On September 1, 2006, Dr. Thomas Brown performed an angioplasty and stent procedure on James McQuiston. Boston Scientific manufactured the stent. McQuiston said his condition (more…)

Professor Ben Zipursky (Fordham) just published a guest post over at Torts Prof Blog ruminating about why the Supreme Court found preemption in the context of medical devices that had undergone premarket approval in Riegel v. Medtronic, but did not find preemption in the context of prescription drugs on the facts of Wyeth v. Levine. That’s an interesting post, and we commend it to you.

We have a couple of reactions to the post, one (more…)

We aren’t the first to note the latest class action denial in the prescription medical product liability field, In re Panacryl Sutures Products Liability Cases, No. 5:08-MD-1959-BO, slip op. (E.D.N.C. Nov. 13, 2009). 360 (subscription only) beat us to the punch the other day. But just because we aren’t first, doesn’t mean there’s nothing in Panacryl worth blogging about.

We view decisions (more…)

We had to comment on the most intriguing case of Hughes v. Boston Scientific Corp., 2009 WL 3817586 (S.D. Miss. Nov. 12, 2009). Hughes involved a PMA device, something called a “HydroTherm Ablator,” that allegedly malfunctioned and injured the plaintiff. Thereafter, the defendant (1) changed its adverse event reporting algorithm in response to FDA concerns, and (2) still later, instituted a Class II recall of the device.
(more…)

We just love to see our victories put to good use by other lawyers in later cases.

So we got a big kick out of Pustejovsky v. Wyeth, No. 4:07-CV-103-Y, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 101513 (N.D. Tex. Sept. 4, 2009).

We didn’t get a big kick out of the facts, since we had nothing to do with them: Dr. Collini prescribed generic Reglan to treat Pustejovsky’s acid reflux. After using the drug for three years, Pustejovsky developed the movement (more…)

The Eighth Circuit’s recent overturning (technically, affirming the district court’s blow out) of a large punitive damages award in a hormone replacement therapy case got us thinking about punitive damages again. SeeIn re Prempro Products Liability Litigation, ___ F.3d ___, 2009 WL 3518245 (8th Cir. Nov. 2, 2009).

Thinking, but not necessarily talking about that case, that is. Herrmann represents Wyeth (which (more…)

We’re not the first to mention this, but we want to make sure our readers know. The recently released House version of the administration’s healthcare reform package contains what is billed as pilot projects for “medical liability reform.” It’s a brief nod in the direction of the elephant in the room – limiting the incessant litigation that drives up the expense of every aspect of healthcare in this country, from the doctors, to the hospitals, to (more…)

We must be pretty poor bloggers. Our throwaway piece on there not being mousepads in hotel rooms drew (for us) a record 3500+ hits last Friday, courtesy of links from Above the Law and Instapundit. That’s second only to Wyeth v. Levine. And it generated over 1000 hits on Saturday and another 800+ on Sunday – both records for those days of the week.

Newsflash: more people care about mousepads than about drug and medical (more…)

We have rules at this blog: We don’t criticize drug and device companies, and we don’t criticize defense law firms.

But we’re making an exception here, and we bet you can understand why: Shook Hardy won an interesting case last week involving the sleeping pill Ambien. More than a dozen folks from Shook Hardy subscribe to this blog. Yet none of those subscribers told us about the firm’s victory! We learned about the Ambien decision (more…)