All news posts from July 01, 2002 to July 31, 2002

Rite Aid Corporation must pay $850,000 to the family of a woman who died shortly after receiving a misfilled prescription at the company's Andalusia, Alabama store. Jewell Deal, 78, died of a heart attack in 1999, one month after Rite Aid filled a prescription for double her doctor-recommended dosage of the blood pres

A former firefighter who suffered permanent brain damage when his oxygen tank unexpectedly ran out of air recently settled a lawsuit with the device's manufacturer for $6.5 million. On October 12, 1998, Mike LeBrun was fighting a fire on the 27th floor of a nursing home in St. Louis, Missouri when his air tank ran out

In a landmark decision involving insurance law, a Federal judge ruled Tuesday that the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) does not pre-empt bad-faith insurance claims in Pennsylvania. ERISA is a Federal law that restricts lawsuits against employer-supplied medical insurance programs. Under ERISA, the har

Officials with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) are still trying to determine what caused yesterday's derailment of an Amtrak passenger train outside of Washington, D.C. A spokesperson for the NTSB said investigators are now focusing on the train's two event recorders, devices similar to an airplane's "

Officials investigating last week's mining accident in Quecreek, Pennsylvania are turning their attention to underground maps that may have been falsified years ago in an attempt to cover up improper mining techniques. On Wednesday night, nine miners unexpectedly drilled into an abandoned mine, known as the Saxman min

A new study led by researchers at the University of West Virginia indicates that performance-enhancing supplements may be the reason for the growing number of high school and college football players who have died from heat stroke. Researchers say supplements such as ephedra, used by athletes to speed their metabolism

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has become aware of a possible association between cochlear implants, devices containing electrodes which are positioned in the cochlea (inner ear) to activate auditory nerve fibers allowing for transmission of sound signals to the brain, and the occurrence of bacterial menin

Nine Quecreek, Pennsylvania coal miners trapped more than 240 feet underground since last Wednesday were rescued early yesterday morning, the result of a successful three-day operation that captivated the nation. On Wednesday night, the miners unexpectedly drilled into an abandoned mine that was thought to be several

An Amtrak train traveling to Washington, D.C. from Chicago derailed this afternoon outside of Kensington, Maryland, about 10 miles north of the capital. Authorities at the scene say dozens of passengers were injured in the accident, six seriously. The train, carrying 190 passengers and 12 crewmembers, had 13 passenge

A Pennsylvania jury recently awarded $1.5 million to a 55-year-old man who suffered permanent scarring over his nose during a botched skin operation. After Ralph Saccomandi went to see Dr. Joseph Ardito to cure his snoring problems, the physician recommended that Saccomandi undergo laser surgery to cure rosacea, chron

A Maui jury ruled against a plastic surgeon earlier this week in the case of a former professional bodybuilder who alleged the physician improperly performed breast implant surgery on her. Before the procedure in September 1997, Sharon Johnston asked Dr. Larry Schlesinger to place implants underneath her chest muscle

Plaintiff attorneys filed dozens of lawsuits this week against several manufacturers of the dietary supplement androstenedione, alleging the companies falsely market the substance as effective. The lawsuits, which were filed yesterday in six states, say androstenedione, a muscle enhancer first made popular by former b

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the popular thyroid medication Synthroid yesterday after 50 years of being marketed without the administration's official endorsement. Synthroid has been sold for decades, but the FDA never required the drug to go through its formal approval process. However, in 19

A 24-year-old Florida man who contracted the HIV virus from a tainted blood transfusion has filed a lawsuit against an area blood bank as well as the hospital where he received the donation. The man is one of two unidentified patients who received tainted transfusions during surgery in mid-March. The plaintiff's atto

A Bexar County, Texas jury recently awarded $1.6 million to an attorney who suffered severe injuries in an automobile accident. Marion T. Carson was a passenger in Bernard Tallerico's Corvette on November 7, 2000, when Tallerico lost control of the sports car on a San Antonio road and slammed into an oak tree and an i

State health officials and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) say at least 26 people are now believed to have become ill after consuming contaminated beef products produced by ConAgra Foods Inc. The announcement comes just days after the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) ordered ConAgra to r

Marriott International was recently found liable in the case of a 25-year-old man who died due to injuries he sustained during a Super Bowl contest in 1995. John Gioffre, 25 at the time of the incident, was attending a convention at the Marriott Orlando World Trade Center hotel in Orlando, Florida when he entered a co

A New York jury recently awarded $1.5 million to two women who were injured in an elevator accident. On April 9, 1998, Marlene Prieto-Santana, 39, and Esther Maquishon, 75, were riding in the elevator of the Bronx Family Courthouse when it suddenly malfunctioned and dropped several floors before coming to an abrupt st

A Federal jury awarded $705,000 last week to a Maryland truck driver who was wrongly accused of stealing $138 worth of gasoline from a Virginia truck stop. Michael Anthony Stamathis was an employee of Alabama-based J-Mar Trucking in December 2000 when he stopped at the Wytheville Flying J Travel Plaza along Interstate

A jury awarded $4.2 million recently to a Maryland woman who suffered severe leg injuries when she fell in the icy parking lot of a sports arena. In 1996, Kerry Ann Lockwood suffered two broken bones in her right leg after slipping in the parking lot of the US Airways Arena in Landover. Lockwood filed suit against th

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) ordered ConAgra Beef Co. Friday to recall nearly 19 million additional pounds of ground beef after 18 people became ill from eating meat contaminated with the bacteria Escherichia coli. On June 30, the federal government asked ConAgra to recall 354,200 pounds of meat after a b

According to a recent report in the Chicago Tribune, over 100,000 deaths in 2000 were due to nosocomial (occurring in a hospital) infections, the fourth leading cause of death in the United States. The figure is more than 10 percent higher than had been estimated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

A jury recently awarded $5.35 million to a 79-year-old woman who suffered severe injuries when she was swarmed by fire ants at a nursing home in Alabama. An employee of Greystone Retirement Community in Huntsville discovered Lucille Devers covered with ants when she entered her room to deliver laundry. Devers was imm

Britain's medicine safety administration may be following in Germany's footsteps regarding future regulation of the herbal supplement kava kava. Yesterday, Britain's Medicines Control Agency (MCA) proposed banning the supply of kava kava due to numerous reports of hepatic damage among users. Last month, Germany's Fed

Two Tampa Bay area residents received devastating news Wednesday when they learned they had contracted the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) from a blood transfusion. The two unidentified patients received the tainted transfusions during surgery in mid-March. According to Florida Blood Services, which supplies 180,0

Two crewmembers died yesterday when their PB4Y air tanker crashed outside of Denver, Colorado while attempting to drop fire retardant on a 1,200-acre wildfire. Witnesses told investigators with the U.S. Forest Service and the National Transportation Safety Board today that after erupting into flames, the plane's left

A New York jury recently awarded $20 million to a construction worker who fell through a ductwork hole while working at a Federal courthouse in Islip. Brian Mahoney, a 36-year-old ironworker, suffered severe spinal injuries when he fell several feet after the ladder he was descending broke through plywood covering the

A California jury recently awarded over $5 million to the children of a construction worker who died after being electrocuted by a live cable while working at the Naval Weapons Station in Concord. Bob McAsey was using a chipping gun to clear concrete at a construction site on the base when he accidentally pierced an u

A Louisiana jury recently awarded $6 million to a mill worker who suffered second- and third-degree burns when he fell into a pit of near-boiling water. On November 1, 1999, Robert Lewis Jr. was working at the Cinclare Central Factory sugar mill in Brusly, La., when he lost his footing and tripped into a pit full of s

A Miami jury recently awarded $6 million to an elderly Florida man who was the victim of road rage. Eighteen-year-old Jason Matthew Helms punched Israel Cabezas, 77, on February 1, 1999, after his pick-up truck struck Cabezas' Mazda Sedan outside of Homestead. Cabezas suffered a broken cheekbone as well as severe bra

Supporters of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) received discouraging news yesterday when the results from a massive study on estrogen-only treatment after menopause revealed an increased risk of ovarian cancer in patients. The report, which appears in today's issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association,

A report in this month's issue of Archives of Surgery reveals that removing a healthy appendix may place a patient at greater risk of suffering damaging side effects. Researchers at the University of Washington reviewed data involving 52,969 appendix removals in 1997 and discovered that in 15 percent of the surgeries

A Michigan jury recently awarded $1.5 million to a white college professor who was the victim of racial and gender discrimination. In 1998, 1999 and 2000, administrators at Delta College in Michigan denied Stephen Buszek's application for a full-time teaching position. He had taught as an adjunct professor for six ye

A Miami jury recently awarded $3.4 million to a 37-year-old carpenter who suffered severe injuries in a construction accident. In March 1996, Daton Arce was descending a ladder on the second floor of a home construction site when it suddenly retracted, causing Arce to fall ten feet to the ground. Upon impact, Arce su

The family of a 23-year-old man who died last year after contracting a rare but deadly bacterial infection from a tainted tissue transplant filed a lawsuit Friday against the tissue provider. On November 7, Brian Lykins, who had been in otherwise perfect health, was killed by the rare but deadly clostridium bacterium

A Texas jury recently awarded $29 million to the family of a 35-year-old man who was killed in an accident involving a Bridgestone/Firestone tire defect. Terry Tripp died in September 2000 after the tread separated on the left rear tire of his Chevrolet Blazer. Jurors determined that Sears Roebuck, the company that s

Pharmaceutical company Bristol-Myers Squibb is under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over allegations that the drug maker overstated its 2001 revenues by nearly $1 billion. According to SEC officials, Bristol-Myers aggressively offered wholesalers incentives last year to purchase drugs in

An Ohio jury awarded $8 million this week to two Akron carpet installers who were seriously injured in an adhesive explosion. In September 1998, Gregory Roach and Gordon Falkner were installing carpet in the basement of a home when the hot water tank clicked on, igniting the 3.5-gallon container of M280 adhesive the m

A Texas jury recently awarded a Harris County man $3.1 million in a product liability lawsuit involving three technological companies. In October 1997, Mohammad Tamoozi underwent brain surgery to remove a tumor. During the procedure, the neurosurgeon, Dr. Robert Levinthal, used an image-guided surgical navigation sys

A racial discrimination lawsuit filed by thirteen New Jersey state troopers has been settled for $4 million. The lawsuit, which had been in process for nearly ten years, alleged that the officers were hazed and denied deserving promotions during their tenure with the department. Plaintiff attorneys filed a complaint

A Texas family recently prevailed in a groundbreaking lawsuit filed against a health maintenance organization (HMO) over a medical malpractice claim. Herschel Pybas, 83, died at a hospital in 1999, days after his HMO, Cigna Healthcare of Texas, moved him from a nursing facility to his home. Plaintiff attorneys, who a

According to an Italian study presented at this year's 14th International AIDS Conference in Barcelona, Spain, medications known as protease inhibitors may increase a patient's risk of developing heart disease. Since their initial use in the mid-1990s to fight the spread of HIV, protease inhibitors have been linked to

Montgomery County, Pennsylvania police departments have filed a lawsuit against Ford Motor Company alleging that their Crown Victoria police cruisers are built with a defective gas tank prone to explosion upon rear impact. The suit is seeking class action status for all Pennsylvania police departments currently using

A St. Louis County Circuit Court jury recently awarded $1,017,000 to a Missouri woman who was the victim of medical malpractice during a routine operation. On February 19, 2000, Wendy Davison was undergoing gall bladder surgery when the attending physician, Dr. Thomas A. Schneider, mistakenly cut her bile duct. Davis

A videotaped beating of a California teenager has led to an internal affairs investigation of several officers employed by the Inglewood Police Department and raised concerns nationwide over law enforcement agencies' use of excessive force. On Saturday, a tourist videotaped Inglewood police officers arresting and subs

The National Institute of Health (NIH) has stopped a 16,608-woman study on the benefits of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) three years early, concluding that hormones such as estrogen and progestin place women who still have their uterus at risk of developing invasive breast cancer. The decision will most likely hav

A Maryland jury recently awarded $1,050,000 to the family of a man who died after doctors failed to discover he was suffering from a pulmonary embolism. On December 21, 1999, Christian Welch, 76, underwent a hemicolectomy, a surgical removal of a portion of the colon, under general anesthesia. Ten days later, Welch w

Plaintiffs involved in a lawsuit against DaimlerChrysler AG over defective seatbelt buckles received encouraging news last week when a Texas judge granted nationwide class-action status to the suit. According to plaintiff attorneys, the Gen 3 seatbelt buckle installed in 14 million DaimlerChrysler vehicles since 1993

A St. Louis jury recently awarded $5 million to a woman who suffered severe injuries because of improper hospital care. In March 1997, after fracturing her jaw in an automobile accident, Carla Suzanne Jennings was taken to Parkland Health Center. She alleged that emergency room technicians failed to properly reevalua

A Harris County, Texas jury recently awarded more than $5 million to the family of a 9-year-old boy who drowned during a canoe excursion. Sam Schubert was a camper at Camp Ozark in Mount Ida, Arkansas in July 2000 when he and several other children and counselors went canoeing down the Ouachita River. During the trip

The prescribing information in the BOXED WARNING, WARNINGS, and PRECAUTIONS sections of the cancer medication Camptosar were recently revised to identify patients at higher risk of severe toxicity, to clarify dose modification guidelines, and to augment information about management of treatment-related toxicities, incl

A new study conducted by researchers at the University of California at San Francisco says that women with heart disease who choose hormone replacement therapy (HRT) after menopause may increase their risk of developing gall bladder problems as well as severe blood clots. Millions of women each year undergo HRT to pre

One of the nation's largest AIDS activist groups filed a lawsuit Monday against GlaxoSmithKline PLC alleging that the pharmaceutical maker has set prices for several AIDS medications excessively high. The group, AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), says Glaxo's prices for leading AIDS medications such as Ziagen, AZT and

A Federal judge recently ruled that a Florida woman may sue her HMO over allegations that one of its agents lied to her about which physician she could see. In August 2000, while Linda Flower was searching for a new Medicare HMO plan, Humana Inc. agent Bill Torres promised that she could continue using Dr. William She

A Colorado jury awarded $1.3 million last week to the family of a woman who fell victim to medical malpractice. On September 11, 2000, 54-year-old Be Luong died, just days after undergoing routine back surgery at the Medical Center of Aurora, Colo. Plaintiff attorneys argued that Luong's surgeon, Dr. Karl Stecher, ac

Johnson & Johnson announced Thursday that it has received over 100 reports of pure red cell aplasia (PRCA) in patients taking the anemia drug Eprex (erythropoietin). The announcement comes one month after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) officially confirmed the drug's link to the disorder in a letter publi

The California Court of Appeals rejected Ford Motor Company's bid Friday to dismiss a $290 million verdict extending from a 1999 Ford Bronco rollover case. Three members of a California family were killed in 1993 when their 1978 Ford Bronco rolled over outside of Modesto. Investigators determined that the vehicle's d

According to a story in yesterday's Los Angeles Times, Warner-Lambert Company executives intentionally concealed pertinent information regarding the dangers of the diabetes medication Rezulin. Documents obtained by the newspaper reportedly indicate that company officials delayed informing physicians and health regulat