10.23.14
The DePuy Orthopedics unit of Johnson & Johnson was cleared by a Texas jury on Oct. 23 in the first case to go to trial to determine if the firm’s Pinnacle hip implants were defective.
The case is the first among more than 6,600 federal lawsuits related to the Pinnacle hips to go to trial. The win is expected to affect DePuy's approach to the rest of the lawsuits.
The jury unanimously found in favor of DePuy on all counts, rejecting plaintiff Kathy Herlihy-Paoli's claims of negligence, defective design, failure to warn and violations of the Montana Consumer Protection Act after nearly two days of deliberations following a two-month trial in Dallas.
The plaintiff received her artificial hips in 2009 but later required multiple surgeries to fix and replace them after the surrounding tissue became infected and the level of the metal cobalt in her blood soared to 85 times the normal level.
DePuy argued the implants were improperly positioned and not to blame for the injuries.
A spokeswoman for DePuy, Mindy Tinsley, told Reuters that the company was pleased with the verdict and intended to continue defending the hip at future trials. The metal-on-metal device "was appropriately developed, thoroughly tested and responsibly marketed," she said in a statement.
During the trial, lawyers for Herlihy-Paoli accused DePuy of aggressively marketing the devices to more active people, while concealing abnormally high failure rates. DePuy’s lawyers countered that the devices were safe when used and implanted properly. They also said Herlihy-Paoli unfairly targeted DePuy for problems linked to different metal-on-metal hip products, such as the company’s ASR devices.
In 2013, DePuy agreed to pay $2.5 billion to settle more than 7,000 lawsuits regarding the ASR devices, which the company recalled in 2010.
DePuy stopped selling Pinnacle devices in 2013.
The case is the first among more than 6,600 federal lawsuits related to the Pinnacle hips to go to trial. The win is expected to affect DePuy's approach to the rest of the lawsuits.
The jury unanimously found in favor of DePuy on all counts, rejecting plaintiff Kathy Herlihy-Paoli's claims of negligence, defective design, failure to warn and violations of the Montana Consumer Protection Act after nearly two days of deliberations following a two-month trial in Dallas.
The plaintiff received her artificial hips in 2009 but later required multiple surgeries to fix and replace them after the surrounding tissue became infected and the level of the metal cobalt in her blood soared to 85 times the normal level.
DePuy argued the implants were improperly positioned and not to blame for the injuries.
A spokeswoman for DePuy, Mindy Tinsley, told Reuters that the company was pleased with the verdict and intended to continue defending the hip at future trials. The metal-on-metal device "was appropriately developed, thoroughly tested and responsibly marketed," she said in a statement.
During the trial, lawyers for Herlihy-Paoli accused DePuy of aggressively marketing the devices to more active people, while concealing abnormally high failure rates. DePuy’s lawyers countered that the devices were safe when used and implanted properly. They also said Herlihy-Paoli unfairly targeted DePuy for problems linked to different metal-on-metal hip products, such as the company’s ASR devices.
In 2013, DePuy agreed to pay $2.5 billion to settle more than 7,000 lawsuits regarding the ASR devices, which the company recalled in 2010.
DePuy stopped selling Pinnacle devices in 2013.