Orange, Va. February 15, 2013. The Miller Firm and the Branch Law Firm recently announced that on February 19, 2013, they will bring the first Actos case to trial against Takeda Pharmaceuticals on behalf of Jack Cooper, an Actos patient struggling with terminal bladder cancer. This first trial is significant because it could influence subsequent trials for some 1,000 other people who have claimed that they were not warned that bladder cancer was a risk with taking Actos for diabetes.

• The Miller Firm is taking on the country’s first Actos case has been set for trial in February 2013, with the Miller Firm representing the Plaintiff against the makers of Actos.
• The trial is set to commence on February 19, 2013 in the Los Angeles Superior Court.
• The Miller Firm continues to aggressively litigate these Actos cases on behalf of all their clients in jurisdictions including Philadelphia, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, New Mexico, Chicago, Milwaukee, Baltimore, and St. Louis.
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Actos Current Case Update:

• The Miller Firm is taking on the country’s first Actos case has been set for trial in February 2013, with the Miller Firm representing the Plaintiff against the makers of Actos.
• The trial is set to commence on February 19, 2013 in the Los Angeles Superior Court.
• The Miller Firm continues to aggressively litigate these Actos cases on behalf of all their clients in jurisdictions including Philadelphia, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, New Mexico, Chicago, Milwaukee, Baltimore, and St. Louis.
• Oral arguments for the case(s) are expected to take place in Savannah, GA at the December Multi-District Litigation (MDL) hearing session.
• At least 11 other lawsuits have been filled in the Northern District of New York, the Northern District of Illinois, the Western District of New York, the District of New Jersey, the Northern District of Ohio and the Central District of California.

Facts about Actos:

Pioglitazone is a prescription drug sold as “Actos” in the United States. Actos is used for the treatment of diabetes mellitus Type 2 and can also be used for diet or exercise programs. It is not used to treat Type 1 diabetes. Actos is in a class of medications called thiazolidinediones. It works by increasing the body's sensitivity to insulin, a natural substance that helps control blood sugar levels.

Recent studies from the FDA and other sources have shown severe negative side effects from taking Actos. If you or a loved one is taking Actos, please read on for facts about the drug and the litigation surrounding it.

• A 2005 Proactive study demonstrated a higher percentage of bladder cancer cases in patients receiving Actos.
• In 2007, the FDA requested that Actos boxes be given a black box label, the strongest FDA-requested label change that can be added to a drug, due to the risk of serious cardiovascular events caused by the drug.
• A study was released on August 24, 2010 showing that the drug was just as dangerous as Avandia in terms of increasing risks of cardiovascular events.
• On June 16, 2011, the FDA required a label change for Actos because the drug, in users using for more than a year, causes a 40% increase in the risk for bladder cancer. Bladder cancer is an aggressive cancer that affects 70,000 Americans a year, with 17,000 dying from the disease.
• On August 17, 2011, the website EHealthMe released a study regarding the side effects of taking Actos and the bladder cancer risk, finding that most of the 22,512 subjects reported side effects when taking Actos and 0.22% have bladder cancer
• France and Germany have banned the use of Actos, an action which affected the FDA’s June 2011 action of requiring a label change.

If you have taken Actos and have had been diagnosed with bladder cancer or have had a serious cardiovascular event, find out how the Miller Firm LLC can help you. Fill out our case review form here on our website and submit it for a free consultation.

Injured after a Transvaginal Mesh Implant or Bladder Sling?

You may be entitled to a CASH SETTLEMENT

Pelvic Organ Prolapse and Stress Urinary Incontinence treatment linked to major side effects.

Women who have had a vaginal mesh patch device implanted could be at risk for a number of internal injuries. The U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has recently released a new safety communication about the use of transvaginal mesh, typically a polypropylene implant, to treat Pelvic Organ Prolapse (POP). This mesh is also used to treat Stress Urinary Incontinence (SUI). The FDA safety communication, released on July 13, 2011, notified health care providers that the serious complications associated with surgical mesh to treat POP are “not rare.”

According to the agency, it has received 1,503 reports of complications with surgical mesh in POP patients from Jan. 1, 2008 to Dec. 31, 2010.

Transvaginal Mesh implants have been linked to a serious conditions such as extrusion of the mesh through the vaginal wall or periphery organs, chronic pain, dyspareunia (pain associated with intercourse), infections, perforations of the bowel, bladder or blood vessels, recurrence of POP and SUI, urinary problems and vaginal scarring. The implants have been known to lead to multiple surgeries down the road.

How can Transvaginal Mesh injure you and your loved ones?

Transvaginal Mesh implants can cause the above symptoms and these symptoms can be permanent as the implant is permanent. Even with future surgery it may not be possible to remove the entire mesh. Examples of transvaginal mesh and bladder sling products include Bard Avaulta, Tyco IVS, Gynecare TVT, MiniArc single incision sling, and Bard Pelvisoft, Pelviclace and Pelvicol. POP and SUI can be treated without using surgical mesh and the risks and benefits must be weighed in order to give informed consent to the procedure.

Call us with questions.

If you have questions, feel free to give us a call. We are still accepting Transvaginal Mesh cases.

Protect your rights. Get compensated for your injuries.

If you or a loved one have suffered a severe side effect as a result of a Transvaginal Mesh implant, you may be entitled to compensation. Complete our Quick Case Review and receive a FREE case evaluation.

• The Miller Firm is taking on the country’s first Actos case has been set for trial in February 2013, with the Miller Firm representing the Plaintiff against the makers of Actos.
• The trial is set to commence on February 19, 2013 in the Los Angeles Superior Court.
• The Miller Firm continues to aggressively litigate these Actos cases on behalf of all their clients in jurisdictions including Philadelphia, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, New Mexico, Chicago, Milwaukee, Baltimore, and St. Louis.
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Medtronic Infuse Current Case Update:

• The Medtronic Infuse Bone Graft is a medical device that is intended to be implanted after lower-back (lumbar) spinal surgery. It works by stimulating bone-growth in this area. It was developed as an alternative to traditional bone grafting, which involves painful bone-harvesting from other areas of the body.
• On November 28, 2006, the MDL (Multi-district litigation) court denied a Medtronic motion to dismiss on the basis of preemption. The defibrillator battery failure MDL litigation is now proceeding in the discovery phase.
• Medtronic is facing three whistleblower lawsuits seeking damages on behalf of the U.S. Government. Medtronic is accused of paying 15 doctors more than $60 million to promote the Infuse and other Medtronic spine products, all while downplaying the risks of severe side effects.
• On March 30, 2012, Medtronic agreed to an $85 million settlement in a lawsuit by shareholders that accused the company of making misleading statements about the Infuse system.

Facts about Meddtronic:

• The Medical Device Safety Act was introduced in Congress to amend the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act to make clear that it does not provide medical device makers total immunity from claims by patients that suffered grave injuries from a faulty device.
• Medtronic has reported five patient deaths associated with fractured Sprint Fidelis leads and the FDA has 599 reports of malfunctions and injuries associated with the Fidelis leads as of January, 2007.
• The FDA issued a class I recall of Medtronic ICDs Micro Jewel II Model 7223Cx and GEM DR Model 7271 defibrillators. The recall was issued because the batteries may short over a period of hours or several days causing the devices to fail.
• The FDA in 2008 issued a Public Health Notification to healthcare providers warning against the use of Infuse Bone Graft in cervical spinal fusions, citing nearly 40 reports of serious injury associated with that specific off-label use.
• Medtronic is also accused of engaging in illegal “off-label” promotion of the Medtronic Infuse Bone Graft.
• When the FDA approved the device in 2002, they only approved it for use in the lower-spine (lumbar) region following spinal surgery. However, there is evidence that the company marketed the device “off-label” for use in upper-spinal or cervical surgeries.
• The risk with such surgeries is that the product can cause massive tissue swelling in the neck and throat area, leading to suffocation and death.
• In a 2011 study, five of the six men who developed a condition called retrograde injection were Infuse recipients.
• A U.S. Senate Finance Committee raised disturbing questions about the integrity of the research used to gain FDA approval of Infuse.
• In a report released in October 2012, Senate investigators charged that Medtronic deliberately manipulated studies to downplay Infuse Bone Graft side effects and promote off-label use of the bone protein.
• The report also found that Medtronic paid out $210 million in royalties, consulting fees, and other payments to the doctors who co-authored the Medtronic-sponsored Infuse studies.

If you have a Medtronic device implanted and you have suffered injury or pain from that device, or have lost a loved one that had a Medtronic device implanted, find out how the Miller Firm LLC can help you. Fill out our case review form here on our website and submit it for a free consultation.

The Miller Firm LLC is extremely proud of the work that was accomplished on the Avandia Litigation. We had the privilege to be named to the Plaintiffs Steering Committee (PSC) and Mike Miller was chosen by his peers as Co-Chairman of the Discovery Committee. The Miller Firm played a an essential role in preparing key aspects of the Avandia Litigation.

GranuFlo/NaturaLyte Current Case Update:

• Reports of heart attack and death led the FDA to recall GranuFlo Concentrate and NaturaLyte Liquid on June 27, 2012, which are products commonly used during dialysis.
• Because of this knowledge and their decision to not inform patients of this issue until March 2012, Fresenius has now found itself opened to numerous lawsuits across the nation.
• It is estimated that 125,000 patients throughout the United States were prescribed Fresenius products before the 2012 recall, leaving tens of thousands possibly effected.
• These lawsuits may eventually be consolidated into a NaturaLyte of GranuFlo class action lawsuit, a state-wide mass tort or a federal multi-district litigation.
• Recently Fresenius settled a wrongful death case for seven figures to the surviving children of Teresa Gayton, a mother of five who died during a dialysis treatment at a Fresenius Medical Care facility in Illinois.

Manufactured by the German medical care company, Fresenius, NaturaLyte Liquid Acid Concentrate and GranuFlo Powderized Acid Concentrate, are dialysates that were being used during kidney dialysis to remove wastes from the blood of patients with acute or chronic renal failure. NaturaLyte is the liquid form of the product and GranuFlo is the powder form.

Facts about GranuFlo/NaturaLyte:

• These products have been shown to increase levels of sodium bicarbonate in the blood which can lead to irregular heartbeat, heart attack, stroke and death.
• The FDA’s warning regarding the recall states that high bicarbonate levels are, “a significant risk factor associated with low blood pressure, hypokalemia, hypoxemia, hypercapnia and cardiac arrhythmia, which, if not appropriately treated, may culminate in cardiopulmonary arrest.” The condition is known as metabolic alkalosis.
• Class I recalls are the most serious type of FDA product recalls and involve situations in which there is a reasonable probability that use of these products will cause serious adverse health consequences and death.
• As a result of the dosing complications, the use of GranuFlo and NaturaLyte products during the dialysis treatments resulted in a four to six times greater risk of cardiopulmonary death or cardiac arrest.
• In 2010 alone, a reported 941 patients had suffered heart attacks while undergoing treatment at FMC clinics around the country.
• An internal Fresenius memo from 2011 stated that Fresenius had knowledge that there was a significant increased risk of sudden cardiac arrest and death associated with the use of GranuFlo during dialysis treatments.

If you or a loved one has experienced sudden cardiac arrest or if someone has died within 72 hours of dialysis that occurred resulting from the use of GranuFlo Concentrate or NaturaLyte Liquid, please contact the Miller Firm LLC now.

The lawyers of The Miller Firm have been working diligently to gather the medical records to determine who manufactured your shoulder pain pump. We’re currently reviewing each case, and getting those cases filed.

More than likely your case will be filed in California, or potentially in the state where you currently live. As you know, we’ve been contacting everyone, reaching out to determine the specifics on your case.

We're pleased to announce that Pete Miller been picked for the Plaintiff Steering Committee for the California consolidated cases, working closely with the judge and the other selected lawyers to ensure that your case gets processed as fast as possible.

We will have a letter update out to you shortly and, as always, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact The Miller Firm at 1 (800) 882-2525.

DEPUY ASR UPDATE (January 19, 2013)

The Miller Firm is working diligently on your case. As of January 18, it was reported that five people close to the DePuy ASR MDL 2197 litigation confirmed settlement discussions. You should know that last night the leadership of the Executive Committee, emailed the following statement to the reporters: “The lawyers and leadership in the cooperating jurisdictions are working for the benefit of the 35,000 United States patients who have this recalled medical device. We have reviewed some 50 million pages of documents that have been produced and have taken over 50 depositions. At this time we have a significant number of trials set with the company and we are primarily focusing our efforts on trial preparation. Any comment relating to settlement that does not come from leadership, the Court, or from the company itself, is speculative and uninformed.”

The first ASR trial in the country will start in Los Angeles on Tuesday. Next month, another trial is set to start in Illinois and the Miller Firm has a trial date set for June in Maryland. Also, the federal litigation has trials in May and July. We are working hard to compensate you for the injuries you have endured and appreciate your patience in this process.

The Miller Firm is a national practice involving the representation of individuals who have been seriously injured by pharmaceutical or other defective products.

A jury recently returned a verdict on three Accutane cases. One was successful. Frankly, two were not. However, it must be remembered that the plaintiffs who have brought the lawsuits have won the vast majority of them.

In order to move your cases forward we're asking the judge to set them for trial. More trials are coming up later this year.

We've had some good news for those of you have taken the generic Accutane—not the brand name drug, but the generic. The judge in Atlantic City who's been overseeing the Accutane litigation is going to be taking the generic cases as well. Our firm is accepting both the brand-name Accutane cases and the generic.

The three injuries that are clearly associated in our view with use of Accutane are ulcerative colitis (where a section of the bowel has been removed) Crohn's disease and bowel disease. These are all devastating and life-altering conditions.

Feel free to give us a call on our toll free number, or fill out our quick contact form, and we'll get back to you promptly.