The Legal Examiner Affiliate Network The Legal Examiner The Legal Examiner The Legal Examiner search instagram avvo phone envelope checkmark mail-reply spinner error close The Legal Examiner The Legal Examiner The Legal Examiner
Skip to main content

 

Lawsuits over retrievable IVC filters continue to grow. In two separate federal litigations there are almost 4000 filings against Cook Medical and C.R. Bard, the two largest manufacturers of IVC filters. Another smaller manufacturer, Cordis Corporation is facing nearly 200 IVC filter lawsuits. Manufacturers Rex Medical, Argon Medical, and B. Braun are also facing IVC lawsuits in state and federal court.

 

Cook Medical faces the largest number of product liability claims involving its Gunther Tulip and Celect IVC filter blood clot filters. Those cases are currently undergoing coordinated pretrial proceedings in a multidistrict litigation underway in U.S. District Court, Southern District of Indiana. C.R. Bard is facing injury claims over its Recovery, G2, Meridian, and Denali products. Cordis Corporation, makers of OptEase and TrapEase IVC filters, currently faces lawsuits alleging life-threatening injuries after being implanted with their filters.

 

IVC filters, or inferior vena cava filters, is a spider-like device that is inserted into the vena cava, the largest arterial, into which the filter deploys with thin, spider-like appendages spreading out to rest against the arterial wall, and designed to capture and trap blood clots passing through the artery and prevent them from reaching the lung.

 

In the last 30 years an estimated 30,000 IVC filters have been implanted. But it wasn’t until 2010, after they’d received thousands of adverse event reports, that the FDA finally issued a warning citing the risk of retrievable filter injuries. It took another four years for the FDA to strengthen the warning when in 2014 they implored doctors to remove IVC filters within about one to two months after the risk of a pulmonary embolism has lessened.

 

A year after the FDA issued the second IVC warning, NBC News aired a bombshell report claiming that medical device manufacturer C.R. Bard continued to market and sell their inferior vena cava (IVC) filters even after the company became aware the filters were failing and causing serious injuries and even death. This 2015 news report went on to link at least 27 deaths and more than 300 injuries to failures associated with C.R. Bards Recovery Model IVC filters. The investigative report also uncovered that IVC devices made by C.R. Bard and Cook Medical had been linked to hundreds of adverse event reports where they punctured the vena cava, tilted out of position or migrated or broke apart and caused metallic fragments to travel to the heart or lungs – a condition known as embolization. Even after C.R. Bard was warned about the problems, they continued to sell the devices, without warning the doctors of the defects and injuries.

 

Patients need to be acutely aware of the high failure rates associated with these devices. Some of the IVC filters being named in lawsuits are the Cook Celect Filter, Cook Gunther Tulip Filter, Bard Recovery Filter,Bard G2 Filter, Bard G2 Express Filter, and the Cordis TrapEase and OptEase. I urge any patient who currently has any IVC filter implanted to consult a physician. Companies responsible for manufacturing and marketing these dangerous devices stand accused of failing to provide doctors with adequate warnings and instructions for IVC filter removal. These same companies are also being charged with concealing the risks associated with their blood clot filters.

 

At Saunders & Walker we continue to represent victims harmed by drugs and medical devices. If you or someone you know have been injured after the having an IVC filter implanted please contact us for a free consultation.

 

At Saunders & Walker we continue to represent victims harmed by drugs and medical devices. If you or someone you know have been injured after the having an IVC filter implanted please contact us for a free consultation.

Comments for this article are closed.