Philadelphia, PAA trial announced in February was believed to be the first Effexor birth defects case to go to trial. However, the loss of a baby girl to plaintiffs Glenn and Lauren Boyer is not the first infant allegedly lost to a lethal ingestion of Effexor by a pregnant woman.
About a year and a week before the Boyer's doomed child was born in 2010, Matthew Schultz came into the world on February 21, 2009. His mother had been prescribed Effexor throughout her pregnancy. The Schultz family blog, Two Hours With Matthew, describes how their family physician looked up Effexor in what was described as a "big, blue book of pharmaceuticals" to determine if it was safe for his patient to continue taking Effexor while pregnant. "He didn't find any warnings for pregnancy problems.
"Looking at it after losing Matthew though, he read it with his eyes open. In tiny print is a warning. But it is quite vague."
What became an Effexor pregnancy, in the end, allegedly cost Matthew Schultz his life. He lived just two hours before succumbing.
Indiana, born to Christian Delahunty, lived longer than Matthew, although there were bumpy patches along the way. Delahunty began experiencing problems with her pregnancy and it was determined the best course of action would be to induce labor a month prior to the due date.
According to the blog The Bitter Pill, Delahunty's obstetrician (OB) was not aware his patient had been taking Effexor until Delahunty presented the attending doctors and nurses with the medications she had been taking.
The OB immediately called down to the neonatal intensive care unit of the hospital to inform medical staff to expect an "Effexor baby."
According to The Bitter Pill, Delahunty's doctor told her previously that Effexor did not pass to the baby either through the placenta, or through breastfeeding.
Indiana stopped breathing at six weeks and died, allegedly from Effexor side effects.
Effexor is widely prescribed as an antidepressant and has been linked, on rare occasions, to Effexor heart defects in newborns.
Adelaide Boyer, upon her birth on February 11, 2010, was found to have lethal cardiac anomalies, including severe left hypoplastic heart, a malformed aorta, no aortic valve, a malformed mitral valve and other related conditions, according to a summary in Business Wire (2/9/12). The Boyers, in their Effexor lawsuit, allege Effexor was responsible for the death of Adelaide and allege fraud and misrepresentation on the part of defendants Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer Inc. and Wolters Kluwer Health/United States, Inc.
On April 28 of this year, someone whose memory of Effexor baby heart defects is still fresh made a brief status entry on the Two Hours With Matthew Facebook page: "Watching the Timbits play soccer this morning and wishing you were on a team too. Sure do miss you little man."
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