J&J’s Ethicon loses $9.8m stapler suit

Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) subsidiary Ethicon lost a $9.8 million suit over injuries caused to a patient by a defective Ethicon PPH 03 hemorrhoid stapler. The case was decided in the Alameda County Superior Court, according to the plaintiff’s counsel, the Alexander Law Group, LLP. The plaintiff alleged that during surgery in January 2012, the defective staple misfired, sealing the patient’s anal canal shut and leading to 21 days of emergency hospitalization, massive infection and resulting abdominal surgeries including a full laparotomy and colostomy. “This is a victory for all those who have been harmed by this known defective stapler. Our outstanding team included lead attorney Nina Shapirshteyn, and she was assisted by counsel Annie Wu. They did an outstanding job poring through more than 45,000 pages of documents and presenting the facts to the jury. But regardless of the amount of the verdict, nothing can replace the harm done to our client by this defective product,” Alexander Law Group managing partner Richard Alexander said in a press release. The PPH03 is used to staple dangling hemorrhoids to the rectal wall in a procedure known as Hemorrhoidoplexy, the firm said. In August, 2012, Ethicon pulled more than 500 lots of its Proximate surgical staplers over performance issues that may cause the devices to misfire. The medical device company issued a global recall of certain lots of its Proximate PPH and HCS hemorrhoidal circular staplers and access...
Source: Mass Device - Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Tags: Legal News Business/Financial News Ethicon Endo-Surgery Johnson & Johnson Source Type: news