Sabatini and Associates, LLC

The diabetes drug Actos has been linked to bladder cancer.  A lawsuit has already been filed in court against Takeda Pharmaceuticals claiming that its diabetes medication Actos caused the plaintiff’s bladder cancer.  In the lawsuit, the plaintiff alleges that Takeda failed to warn of the risks of bladder cancer connected with Actos and that had there been such a warning the plaintiff would have sought an alternative course of treatment. 

Recent studies have indicated a connection between Actos usage and an increased likelihood of bladder cancer.  The FDA studied data from the first five years of a 10 year Actos safety study begun in 2002 and concluded that risk of bladder cancer was 40 percent higher for patients taking Actos for at least one year.  Doctors in France and Germany have been advised to stop prescribing Actos. If you or a loved one has taken Actos for more than one year, you may have a claim for damages and should contact our attorneys today.

The F.D.A. is conducting a review of certain birth control bills that contain the hormone drospirenone.  The hormone is found in Bayer’s Yaz, Yasmin, Beyaz and Safyral. While all birth control pills pose a rik of blood clots, certain studies have suggested that Bayer’s birth control pills pose a greater risk of blood clots.  Two recent reports in the British Medical Journal found a two-fold to threefold greater risk of blood clots in women taking birth control pills like Bayer’s Yaz.  The F.D.A. ‘s current review involves an 800,000 person study.  The sale of Yaz family of products in 2010 represented 3.3 percent of Bayer’s annual revenue. The lawyers at Sabatini & Associates, LLC currently represent women injured by Yaz and Yasmin and is accepting new cases.

Bailed out by the taxpayers, but off the hook for compensating some of the very same people who have been seriously injured by their defective motor vehicles, this is the deal Chrysler and GM got as part of their government bailouts. When the U.S. Government brokered a bankruptcy for Chrysler two years ago, it allowed the car maker to discharge any and all obligations it owed to car accident victims with pending cases against the automaker, or those who had already won an award or settlement. The Wall Street Journal has tracked several stories of some of the losers in the government deal, including the family of Vicki Denton. Ms. Denton died when the airbag in her 1998 Dodge Caravan failed to deploy in a collision. After years of litigation, in 2009 a jury determined that Ms. Denton’s vehicle was defective, and order Chrysler to pay her son $2.2 million in damages. Despite the jury’s finding, Chrysler has not paid the judgment, and under the rules of the bailout will never have to.

Attorney James Sabatini has reached another settlement for his client involved in a car accident that left little visible property damage.  Cases involving little visible property damage are challenging.  The lack of visible property damage provides the defense lawyer with a simple and easy argument- if there is no significant property damage, how can there be a real injury?  There are multiple ways in which to counter such an argument.  One, while there may be little visible property damage, has there been an inspection of the vehicle behind the bumper cover.  In many instances, the damage from the collision is covered by the bumper guard. Two, did anyone hear a noise caused by the impact? If the answer is yes, then the impact was significant enough to cause a noise. Three, did the impact cause the body of the occupant of the vehicle to be moved. If yes, then the impact was significant and real. Four, was the defendant surprised by the lack of damage to his car. If yes, then the impact was significant. Five, did the injured person have any prior injuries/accidents or subsequent injuries/accidents involving the same body part claimed to be injured in the present collision. If the answer is no, it is a powerful argument that through a process of elimination, only the subject collision could have caused the injuries. Six, do you have a credible doctor supporting the person’s claim of injury? If you do  not, the chances of success are seriously if utterly damaged.  These are some but not all of the items used to take a case that is perceived to be weak by the insurance company and transform itin to a case of strength resulting either in a strong settlement or well positioned for a successful outcome at trial.

The DePuy Hip Implant litigation continues to grow. In December 2010, the court approved a multidistrict litigation (MDL) for the cases filed in federal court. State class actions cases have been filed in Ohio and California.  In August 2010, Depuy recalled 93,000 hip implants.  The hip implants have a higher failure rate than other hip replacement devices. One out of eight patients has had to undergo a second hip replacement surgery due to the defective implant. Besides the high failure rate, the device also may cause elevated levels of cobalt and chromium in the body which can develop into metallosis – a buildup of metallic debris in soft tissues. It is believed that the metal on metal design of the hip implant is causing the metallosis.