As the transvaginal lawsuits enter its fifth year, the massive litigation over the defective transvaginal mesh and bladder sling plastic devices is coming into settlement phase. American Medical System (AMS), saw the light early, threw in the towel earlier last year, and announced a multibillion dollar settlement and settled its docket of over 20,000 lawsuits.
According to a pretrial order earlier in April, U.S. District Judge Joseph Goodwin set a joint status conference for June 2, 2015. Each manufacturers, except for Neomedic, has been ordered to appear, and Judge Goodwin will hammer out the various defendants towards settlement.
Serious settlement discussions are underway involving the remaining vaginal mesh manufacturers who have not yet settled. There are 4 big players when it comes to the controversial vaginal mesh and bladder sling devices. These include AMS, CR Bard, Boston Scientific and Johnson and Johnson and its subsidiary Ethicon.
There is a scramble underway to try and settle these cases and not to be the last man standing or have to try thousands of cases that have been stuck in the federal court system over the past 5 years.
If there is no settlement, then these languishing cases will be remanded or sent back to their local federal districts for individual trials. If that happens, the sheer number of litigants will simply overwhelm the entire federal court system, creating havoc and roadblocks, lasting for years.
Johnson and Johnson Ethicon Gynecare Mesh Verdict
Johnson and Johnson (J&J) the world’s largest pharmaceutical and medical device maker is hammered in another loss in the on going transvaginal mesh wars. In the latest of a series of trials held in state and federal court, the jury has awarded $5.7 million verdict against J&J and its Ethicon subsidiary, over Ethicon’s Gynecare TVT Abbrevo device.
TransVaginal Wars Continue
There are more than 75,000 personal injury and product liability lawsuits against Ethicon and manufacturers of other similar products, including Boston Scientific, C.R. Bard, American Medical Systems (AMS), Coloplast, Cook Medical, Neomedic and others.
According to the latest court data from March, Judge Goodwin is overseeing at least 23,569 Ethicon vaginal mesh, 19,093 American Medical Systems (AMS) mesh, 15,429 Boston Scientific mesh, 10,525 Bard Avaulta mesh, 1,870 Coloplast vaginal mesh, 288 Cook Medical vaginal mesh and 83 Neomedic vaginal mesh lawsuits.
Transvaginal Mesh and Bladder Sling: No Benefit
Thousands of women had a vaginal mesh or bladder sling implanted to treat pelvic organ prolapse or stress urinary incontinence. These unfortunate women have suffered severe internal injuries, urinary problems and other catastrophic complications as a result of the plastic medical devices, which may actually provide no benefit over other traditional methods of treating pelvic organ prolapse or stress urinary incontinence.
Latest California Ethicon Trial
Recently, a California state jury, ordered Ethicon to pay Coleen Perry $700,000 in compensatory damages for complications with Gynecare TVT Abbrevo mesh.
$5 Million Punitive Damages Awarded
The jury also slammed the mesh manufacturer with $5 million in punitive damages, after they found the company acted with gross negligence.
Punitive damages are designed to punish Ethicon for acting with malice towards Perry and other women, finding that the company knew that the TVT Abbrevo vaginal mesh caused severe and serious complications, but failed to warn the doctors or patients.
Federal Vaginal Mesh MDL LitigationThe federal complaints blame the products which are used to treat pelvic organ prolapse (POP) and stress urinary incontinence (SUI). The injured women claim that the products are defectively designed and cause serious complications, including infections, puncturing vital organs and eroding or perforating through the vagina.
