The National Trial Lawyers presented An Update on Xarelto Mass Tort Litigation on June 23, 2015.
Presenter: Gabe Zambrano of Farmer, Jaffe, Weissing, Edwards, Fistos & Lehrman, P.L. in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. He is spearheading the investigation of side effects associated with Xarelto.
Mr. Zambrano served as co-counsel in an Engle Tobacco trial in 2011 that resulted in one of the largest reported verdicts that year. Today, he advocates for victims of personal injuries, and develops mass tort projects where patients suffer injuries from drugs or pharmaceutical devices, including Yasmin, Mirena IUD, Pradaxa, and Nuvaring Vaginal Ring. He continues to speak at national conferences and organizational meetings making him available to aid victims across the United States through co-counsel relationships in multiple jurisdictions.
Xarelto is a prescription medication used to treat patients with atrial fibrillation, or AFib, not caused by a heart valve problem. Atrial Fibrillation is a heart condition that causes blood to pool in the upper chambers of the heart and increases the chance of a stroke or blood clot.
In the United States, Xarelto has also been approved to treat blood clots in the legs (deep vein thrombosis) and in the lungs (pulmonary embolism).
In September 2013, reports emerged in Germany that Xarelto had been linked to 968 side effect reports, which included 58 deaths, with German drug regulators.
According to US lawsuits, hundreds of patients died because of bleeding caused by the drug. In 2012, the FDA reported that three times more people died from adverse events while on Xarelto compared to Warfarin.
In addition, while it is supposed to prevent blood clots, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has already received reports of dangerous blood clots in people taking the drug.
The number of potential deaths in the US are not known because the adverse event reporting system is a volunteer system. However, it is known that in combination, Xarelto, Pradaxa and Warfarin or Coumadin have been linked to 789 deaths in 2013.
As anticipated, the growing number of lawsuits has drawn the attention of victims from across the country. Realizing that they are not alone, or that they suffered side effects that others also endured, they have come forward and sought legal counsel. Most recently, this culminated on December 12, 2014, in a ruling by the United States Judicial Panel on Multi District Litigation ("JPML").
It entered a transfer order consolidating all pending Xarelto lawsuits. This order announced the formation of a Federal Multi District Litigation (MDL): In re Xarelto (Rivaroxaban) Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2592, before the Honorable Edlon E. Fallon in the Eastern District of Louisiana.
