Family Awarded $5.5 Million in Duragesic Patch Suit
Posted by
Jenny AlbanoJune 21, 2007 9:37 AMThe father of a man who died while wearing a Duragesic patch was awarded $5.5 million on Tuesday by a federal jury in West Palm Beach. The jury decided that the drug's company was liable for Adam Hendelson's death.
The Hendelson family sued Johnson & Johnson subsidiaries Janssen Pharmaceutica Products and the ALZA Corporation over their son Adam's death in 2003. Adam died of an overdose of fentanyl, a powerful painkiller, when the Duragesic patch he wore for hip pain leaked onto his skin. When he was found he had three times the lethal dosage in his system.
This case was only the second Duragesic case to go to trial, and the first to make it to federal court. In 2006, a Houston woman was awarded $772,500 by Johnson & Johnson because he mother died after wearing the patch. Now dozens of other files have been claimed against the companies. Gulas & Stuckey, the Hendelson's attorneys, have eight cases pending trial.
The Duragesic patch has had problems in the past. In February, 2004 Janssen issued a recall of one manufacturing lot because the patch might leak on one side. In April of the same year five lots were recalled, which included around 2.2 million patches. These recalls spurred a 2005 investigation by the FDA of 120 deaths of patch users.
According to the manufacturer, these patches "contain a strong opiate in the form of a gel" and "overexposure may cause potentially life threatening complications".
For more information on this subject, please refer to our section on Drugs, Medical Devices, and Implants.