In early May, Searcy Denney mass tort lawyers Cal Warriner and Brenda Fulmer filed yet another lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson and DePuy Orthopaedics, Inc. This latest case was filed on behalf of a Southwest Florida resident who was implanted with the defective Pinnacle brand hip implant at Lee Memorial in Fort Myers, Florida in 2008. The Pinnacle implant family manufactured by J&J’s orthopedic division includes a number of different components that are assembled by the surgeon during the total hip arthroplasty procedure.
This particular plaintiff received a Pinnacle metal insert and an Articul/Eze metal-on-metal femoral head. Not all components that are part of the Pinnacle hip implant family involve metal-on-metal bearing surfaces. This device failed in 2014, after being implanted for less than six years, and the plaintiff was required to undergo a painful revision surgery to remove the defective hip implant hardware. She also suffered significant pain and tissue damage due to metallosis, pseudotumor formation, and other injuries and harm caused by the breakdown of the metallic surfaces of the implant and release of cobalt and chromium into her bloodstream.
In contrast to the recalled DePuy ASR design, the Pinnacle metal on metal construct contains three different metal on metal articulations. Two of these include the combination of dissimilar metals at a taper interface. The mixing of dissimilar metals is a concern that has been documented in the scientific and orthopedic literature since the 1980’s. The first concerning interface involves a titanium, porous ingrowth acetabular shell into which a chrome/cobalt acetabular insert is placed. This interface creates a very large “crevice” or void between the dissimilar metal surfaces thereby substantially increasing the risk of Mechanically Assisted Crevice Corrosion (MACC). The second concerning interface involves the actual bearing surface or the mating of the chrome/cobalt acetabular insert with the chrome/cobalt femoral head. These “metal on metal” articulations have been widely criticized as dangerous to patients despite the fact both surfaces are made from the same metal. The third concerning interface is where the chrome/cobalt femoral head seats onto the titanium femoral stem. Again, this connection creates a crevice into which biologic contaminant can enter. Motion at the interface in the presence of biologic material (proteins and acids) significantly increases the risk of device failure due to “metallosis” from MACC induced corrosion.
This latest lawsuit filing bears a striking resemblance to hundreds of other individual lawsuits that the law firm has filed against Zimmer, Stryker, Smith & Nephew, Biomet, Wright Medical, and DePuy for defective metal-on-metal and modular hip implant devices. The lawsuits filed over the failed Pinnacle device are being coordinated before Judge Kinkeade, a federal court judge in Dallas, who oversees thousands of cases filed by patients who have been harmed by these DePuy devices. There are now thousands of individual lawsuits pending in the federal court MDL proceedings and various state court jurisdictions. The first trial in a Pinnacle case resulted in a verdict in favor of DePuy in the fall of 2014. Recently, Judge Kinkeade chose 10 additional individual cases to be prepared for the next trial in the federal MDL. In the coming months, the parties will complete depositions of plaintiffs, family members, and physicians in those 10 cases before embarking on additional discovery relating to expert witness testimony.
Searcy Denney partner Cal Warriner was recently added to the Plaintiff’s Steering Committee for this MDL and is assisting the plaintiffs’ team in the preparation for these upcoming bellwether trials in the MDL by working with a number of leading experts in the areas of pathology, tribology, materials science, immunology, toxicology and orthopedic surgery. It is anticipated that Judge Kinkeade will announce future trial dates in the MDL in the coming months.
