The Nebraska Injury Law Report

Forbes reports that Walgreens was hit with a large verdict due to a medication error that resulted in a patient taking ten times the proper dosage.

A jury awarded $25.8 million Friday to the family of a cancer patient who was given a wrong prescription, had a stroke and died several years later, lawyers said.

Beth Hippely was prescribed Warfarin, a blood thinner, in 2002 to treat breast cancer. The prescription filled at a Walgreens pharmacy was 10 times what her doctor prescribed, court documents said.

The Polk County Circuit Court jury found the prescription error caused a cerebral hemorrhage resulting in permanent bodily injury, disability and physical pain. The mother of three died in January at the age of 46.

A 19-year-old pharmacy technician, with little training, misfiled the prescription, according to court documents.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to a medication error, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free and we handle cases on a contingency fee basis.

In this day of media saturation it may be hard to believe but some people miss news of product recalls. From the Consumerist:

. . . NPR introduces us to James Millard Wilson, an art student in Baltimore who missed the news of the American Medical Optic (AMO) Complete MoisturePLUS Multipurpose Contact Lens Solution. He used to solution and got a painful eye infection that could have lead to blindness if he hadn’t gone to the hospital.

How did he miss the news? James doesn’t watch tv or use the internet.

“We rely on the media to a greater or lesser extent depending on the particular recall we’re working on,” Tim Ulatowski of the Food and Drug Administration says. Is that enough? What about people who don’t like the media? From NPR:

“Now the problem with that, of course, is that if you’re not reading, watching or listening in the right place, you’re gonna miss the news,” says Donald Mays, senior director for public safety planning for Consumer Reports magazine.

Many people did miss the announcement. The company checked and found stores that still had Complete MoisturePLUS Multipurpose solution on their shelves.

Reports of new infections came in to the CDC. The FDA had to send out a second press release a couple of weeks ago. Ulatowski said the challenge was the size of the recall — 28 million bottles since May 2005.

“It’s difficult to reach into everyone’s medicine cabinet to determine that that product has been controlled and returned or disposed of by the consumer,” he says.

To listen to the full report from NPR click here.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to a dangerous product, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free and we handle cases on a contingency fee basis.

. . . or sharpened pencils is a bad idea. So far as I know, this personal injury did not result in a lawsuit–just this fascinating x-ray:

A woman in Germany who has spent 55 years with part of a pencil inside her head has finally had it removed.

Margret Wegner fell over carrying the pencil when she was four. It punctured her cheek and part of it went into her brain, above the right eye.

The 59-year-old has suffered headaches and nosebleeds for most of her life.
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Bloomberg news reports:

A New Jersey judge upheld a $13.5 million verdict against drugmaker Merck & Co., won by a couple who sued over injuries the man sustained after he took the company’s Vioxx painkiller.

The Aug. 7 ruling by Atlantic County Superior Court Judge Carol Higbee denied Merck’s request for a new trial or a reduction in the damages, which included the jury’s punitive award of $9 million. Higbee also awarded the couple $2 million in attorney fees and costs plus $2,552 per day in interest.

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John and Irma McDarby sued Whitehouse Station, New Jersey- based Merck in 2005 after John McDarby, who used Vioxx for four years, suffered a heart attack. Their suit is one of more than 10,000 filed against the company.

Merck withdrew Vioxx from the market in 2004 after a study showed it doubled the risk of a heart attack in patients after 18 months of use.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to a dangerous product, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free and we handle cases on a contingency fee basis.

Given the prevalence of heart disease, you should know the signs and symptoms of heart attack.  So should your medical provider or it could cost you–and them.

Every year in the United States, 7 million people go to hospital emergency rooms complaining of chest pain or other symptoms that suggest they might be having a heart attack. A missed heart attack diagnosis garners the highest malpractice payout among all medical malpractice cases.

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The statistics surrounding heart disease and heart attacks in the U.S. are startling. A heart attack occurs about every 20 seconds, and deaths from heart attacks occur approximately once a minute. Almost 14 million Americans have a history of heart attack or angina (chest pain or discomfort that occurs when your heart muscle does not get enough blood).

Shortness of breath, often occurring at the same time as chest pain but can occur before chest pain, also Chest discomfort/pain (squeezing, pressure, or fullness) Discomfort in other areas of the upper body (one or both arms, back, neck, jaw or stomach) Cold sweat, nausea, and light-headedness.

More than 233,000 women die each year from heart disease; yet, most women do not experience chest pain when having a heart attack. Instead, they frequently experience nausea and vomiting, which often leads doctors to misdiagnose a woman’s heart attack as a gastro-intestinal problem. According to recent studies, women waited an average of almost 25 minutes longer than men for clot-buster treatments, which can stop a heart attack. Misdiagnosing a heart attack or a heart condition puts the patient, female or male, at risk for stroke, paralysis and death.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to a medical error, call the experienced medical malpractice attorneys of Keating, O’Gara, Nedved, & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the “Contact Us” form in the upper left-hand portion of this page.