Posts Tagged ‘ DePuy Hip Replacement ’

Infographic: 5 Hip Replacement Options, 1 with Lawsuits

July 24th, 2011. By

 


With the recent FDA approval of the DePuy Pinnacle CoMplete Acetabular Hip, we thought it might be helpful to put it all down on an infographic that shows the different types of hip implant components and which one has been the target of hip replacement lawsuits. Find more information on the metal-on-metal (MoM) DePuy ASR hip replacement here.

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Posted in Defective Products, Drugs/Medical | 1 Comment »

Attorney Reeves Whalen Picks Fights for Good Causes

June 13th, 2011. By

Lawyers Giving Back looks at a side of lawyers you don’t hear too much about—the side that gives back…pays it forward..and shares the love. We’ve found quite a number of attorneys who log non-billable hours helping others—simply because they believe it’s the right thing to do. Their stories are inspiring, and hey, who knew lawyers were so…good? If you’ve got a story to share about an attorney who’s doing the right thing, let us know—we’d love to let others know, too. Today, we’re talking with attorney Reeves Whalen of Burg Simpson…

Attorney Reeves Whalen: “…whenever you have an opportunity to see how others live it changes…what you are willing to do to help other people.”

Attorney Reeves Whalen epitomizes the idea that we are the sum total of our experiences. Raised in Massachusetts in a family of five biological and six adopted siblings, including a younger brother and sister who are disabled, an older brother with Down’s Syndrome, two African American siblings, a Hispanic brother and a Native American sister, Whalen comes to the table, any table in fact, with a depth and understanding few other young lawyers can match.

Attorney Reeves Whalen helping at a Girls Orphanage in Haiti

“I think the lessons I learned from my childhood gave me a barometer to assess right and wrong and have definitely led me to a place where I feel pretty comfortable picking my fights,” says Whalen, who joined the Burg Simpson law firm after graduating from the University of Denver in 2007.

Whalen was nominated for the 2010 Colorado Bar Association’s Outstanding Young Attorney Award and recently named to the Denver Business Association’s Top 40 under 40 list. He is part of Burg Simpson’s mass tort litigation team and involved in Yaz birth control litigation and the DePuy hip replacement litigation. He also is managing a number of other personal injury files. At 32, Whalen is just getting started.

“Burg Simpson has always been committed to helping families in dire situations when they’ve been injured or hurt by large commercial interests. I am proud to be associated with this law firm. Just as I am in my personal life, people here are dedicated to the idea that when someone falls down you step in and help them.”

And for Whalen, stepping in to help goes far beyond the confines of the office or the courtroom. In 2009, before the earthquake brought international attention Haiti’s unfathomable problems, Whalen, inspired by a book about a doctor working in Haiti, did a tour of duty helping build an orphanage 3 hours from Port Au Prince.

“It was pretty scary actually,” says Whalen. “There’s no electricity, no clean water and no healthcare really. You are talking about a country that has 200,000 kids orphaned by the AIDS epidemic and over 50 percent of the population can’t read,” says Whalen who was there working with the Center of Hope organization. 

Whalen also serves on the board of Save Our Youth (SOY), a Denver organization that emerged from the city’s problem with gang violence and offers mentorship to at-risk young people. “I personally mentor two young African-American brothers, one 14 and the other 17,” says Whalen who says he is attracted to projects that focus on education.

“There are good things out there worth fighting for, it changes your perspective on the world and there are a lot of worthy causes out there,” says Whalen who recently drove all night to get to an Indian reservation in South Dakota to participate as a guest teacher at a Native American history class.

“I think whenever you have an opportunity to see how others live it changes how you think and changes what you are willing to do to help other people,” adds Whalen.

Reeves Whalen is a graduate of Denver University of Denver Sturm College of Law. Whalen specializes in commercial litigation, products liability and personal injury cases at Burg Simpson. He has helped raise funds to finance a group of medical professionals who traveled to Haiti to assist in the earthquake relief efforts. In 2010, Whalen organized a Continuing Legal Education seminar on Immigration Reform.

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Posted in Emerging Issues, Lawyers Giving Back | 3 Comments »

DePuy Hip Replacement Signs of Trouble

November 12th, 2010. By

DePuy ASR Hip Replacement RecalledOne of the most interesting things I’ve come across while reading some DePuy ASR Hip Replacement recall message boards is that many hip replacement patients don’t seem to even know what hip implant they received. The upshot of that is that, at the least, they have no clue what’s been put inside their bodies, and at the worst, if there is a problem with the implanted medical device, they may not know it—or news of such must rely on a string of communications from manufacturer to health provider to patient—and that’s if you’re lucky.

So news of the DePuy hip implant recall may—or may not—have reached those who actually have received the ASR hip replacement—and that’s not an ideal situation for such a serious recall.

The DePuy hip replacement recall was for about 93,000 units of the DePuy ASR Hip (manufactured by DePuy Orthopaedics). While some online reports were suggesting that upwards of 80,000 DePuy ASR Hip patients may ultimately need hip replacement revision surgery, studies have been done that suggest the rate of hip revision surgery is more in the range of 12-13%—meaning that one in twelve to thirteen DePuy Hip patients may well need hip revision surgery within five years of having their initial DePuy hip replacement surgery.

So if you’re one of those patients—one of the 12-13%–how would you know it?

From actual reader comments, it sounds like one of the main symptoms is the inability to squat—at least not to the full range that you should be able to post-surgery and post-therapy. There have also been first-hand reports of things like still using crutches for much longer than the usual timeframe anticipated post-hip replacement surgery. But the main signs to look for—those that appear to be consistent among patients with a defective DePuy ASR hip implant are these:

  • Pain—or continued pain—in the hip, leg, lower back or groin area, after the appropriate healing time has passes
  • The feeling that something is “loose” in your hip
  • A “clicking” sound in the hip area
  • The feeling that the hip is slightly dislocated or not fully connected while in motion, particularly when standing up or lowering oneself, or during general leg/hip movements
  • The inability to fully move within the normal range of one’s physical activity

Given that DePuy lawsuits have been filed, and that seeking legal help may be the only way for someone who’s received a defective DePuy hip replacement to ensure that they get any damages that may be awarded to them, if you’ve had hip replacement surgery and are experiencing any of the above symptoms and they don’t appear to be going away, you should first contact your doctor and/or surgeon to find out the manufacturer and make of the hip implant you received. If it was indeed the DePuy ASR hip, you should most likely speak with an attorney who specializes in DePuy hip lawsuits.

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Posted in DePuy ASR Hip Recall, Emerging Issues | 30 Comments »

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