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Ethicon Media Monitoring 7/21/2017
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Our public health guardians have been asleep at the wheel as vaginal mesh tragedy unfolds
Jul 20, 2017 | The Guradian
By Danny Vadasz
It seems inconceivable that the tragedy of failed vaginal mesh implants could have continued undetected for 16 years. And yet it did. -
'I told my husband he could sleep with someone else': Mother-of-two, 43, can no longer have sex and depends on a mobility scooter after being fitted with controversial vaginal mesh implant
Jul 20, 2017 | The Daily Mail
By Stephan Mathews
A mother-of-two claims she can no longer have sex with her husband after she was fitted with a controversial vaginal mesh implant which has 'ruined her life'. -
Mum claims vaginal mesh implant means she can barely walk, work or have regular sex with husband
Jul 20, 2017 | Mirror
By Rosa Mcmahon
Left with severely impaired bladder control after the birth of her second child Cat Lee, 43, even suggested he could sleep with someone else as she was in so much pain -
Wife told husband to sleep with other people after vaginal mesh ruined their sex life
Jul 20, 2017 | Metro.co.uk
By Toby Meyjes
A mum-of-two told her husband to have sex with other people after a vaginal mesh operation ruined their sex life. -
Western Australian pelvic mesh victims criticise government response to scandal
Jul 20, 2017 | Newcastle Herald
By Joanne McCarthy
SUE Turner and Jeanette McKinnon are the Western Australian women implanted with pelvic mesh devices in public hospitals who refuse to be regarded as unfortunate statistics. -
Woman Left Disabled By Vaginal Mesh Implant (Photos)
Jul 20, 2017 | Opposing Views
By Michael Howard
A married English woman with two children can no longer have sex with her husband due to a vaginal mesh implant that left her unable to walk.
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Our public health guardians have been asleep at the wheel as vaginal mesh tragedy unfolds
Jul 20, 2017 | The Guradian
By Danny Vadasz
It seems inconceivable that the tragedy of failed vaginal mesh implants could have continued undetected for 16 years. And yet it did.
In fact mesh implants remained the preferred clinical procedure to deal with pelvic prolapse and urinary stress incontinence, with estimates suggesting that over 100,000 women have undergone the procedure in Australia.
Obstetricians and gynaecologists have been so confident of the outcome of these implants, they haven’t felt the need to warn their patients of the risks or that the implants are irreversible.
Even when warning signs emerged – and there were plenty of them – women suffering post-operative injury were characterised as outliers, unfortunate but rare failures in the shadows of the glowing success of the devices.
The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) whose role it is to establish the efficacy and safety of medical devices recorded only 99 adverse outcomes over five years from 2012. From its perspective, this doubtlessly vindicated the claims of manufacturers and surgeons that mesh implants had enhanced the lives of thousands of women.
However we, the Health Issues Centre (HIC), repeatedly heard from women who claimed their lives had been destroyed as a consequence of these implants.
In fact it took a senate inquiry, the HIC and a network of small consumer health organisations to expose what is without a doubt the worst self-inflicted public health crisis since the thalidomide tragedy.
Over six weeks in April and May 2017, HIC conducted research to determine how many women in Australia have been adversely impacted by mesh implants. In those six weeks, we received over 2,000 survey responses and the data was horrifying: 58% of respondents claimed that the procedure failed to resolve their health concerns, with 65% describing their consequent suffering as severe (23%), debilitating (31%) or unendurable (12%). Just 35% believed they had been adequately informed of the risks and potential adverse outcomes of mesh implants.
So why were we able to identify what had evaded the guardians of our health system for so long?
Because we went looking and gave women anonymity and the opportunity to be tell us of their experiences without the added stress and humiliation of public disclosure.
Sadly much of the current debate about the extent of the problem has been framed in terms of the good outcomes of the many outweighing the unfortunate experiences of a few, with clinicians continuing to refer to mesh implants as the gold standard for dealing with incontinence and prolapse.
What they forget is that our health system is based on values such as equity and a universal duty of care, not on a cost/benefit analysis that accepts the unavoidability of collateral damage.
When a few hundred babies were born with birth defects in the 1950s as a result of thalidomide, nobody suggested this was a defensible offset against the thousands of women who had been cured of morning sickness. The product was swiftly and decisively withdrawn from use.
Perhaps we need that event to remind us of the human dimensions of the mesh implants tragedy and to ensure our sense of humanity is not subordinated to a statistical dispute over acceptable failure rates.
But beyond the personal tragedy of women whose lives have been ruined by failed mesh implants is the catastrophic system failure of the very regulatory institutions established to protect public health.
Interestingly, it was in direct response to the thalidomide crisis that the government created what would be the precursor to the TGA. The intent of the organisation was to ensure the public would never again be victims of unproven clinical treatment.
Ironically it is the TGA that has now been singled out for its failure to adequately assess mesh devices before allowing them to proliferate.
While the TGA has many questions to answer, it is not alone in failing its duty of care. Vaginal mesh implants represent a whole-of-system failure and implicates Commonwealth and state health authorities, the various state and federal complaints commissions, the large number of surgeons conducting mesh implant surgery without informed consent, and the professional associations representing these practitioners.
All these guardians of public health have been asleep at the wheel while the mesh implants tragedy has unfolded. They have collectively failed to:adequately evaluate the safety and efficacy of medical devices and procedures;
establish a comprehensive register of mesh products and procedures;
provide adverse reporting systems to accurately represent health consumer outcomes;
act on international evidence and warnings including those of the FDA;
initiate the recall of products held in stock even after they have been withdrawn from market;
enforce adherence to the principles and practice of informed consent;
adopt a patient-centred approach in the treatment of affected women;
apply precautionary principles in the face of mounting evidence of adverse outcomes.However the mesh implants tragedy is also indicative of a broader social and political failure. Despite the lessons we should have learned from the under-reporting of rape, domestic violence and child sexual abuse, we have yet again failed in our duty of care to protect the vulnerable.
In all of these circumstances we elect denial rather than acknowledge system failure. We diminish the tragedy by characterising the cases as exceptional, unrepresentative of typical outcomes. We put the burden of proof on the shoulders of victims who have already been shattered by their experiences. We challenge and discredit them until they doubt their own lived experience. We plead ignorance of the facts and search for convenient scapegoats. We look for closure through expressions of regret rather than genuine remorse and reform.
To rebuild trust in our safety regime, we must firstly admit that our current system has failed us, then begin the task of rebuilding a safety regime that acts decisively with foresight rather than justifying inaction in hindsight.
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Jul 20, 2017 | The Daily Mail
By Stephan Mathews
· Cat Lee underwent the procedure to treat her incontinence after childbirth
· But the vaginal mesh surgery left her in so much pain, forcing her to retire
· She even gave her husband the opportunity to sleep with someone else
· The true extent of the vaginal mesh scandal came to light earlier this year
· Experts are now calling for a public inquiry which has left hundreds in agony
A mother-of-two claims she can no longer have sex with her husband after she was fitted with a controversial vaginal mesh implant which has 'ruined her life'.
Cat Lee, 43, underwent the procedure, which has left hundreds of other British women in agony, to treat her incontinence after childbirth.
But it left her in so much pain, forcing her to retire and made her completely dependent on a mobility scooter as she is unable to walk or stand.
Mrs Lee, from Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, even gave her husband Gordon, 46, the opportunity to sleep with someone else as the discomfort stopped her from making love.
The true extent of the mesh came to light earlier this year, with senior doctors now calling for a public inquiry into its usage, saying it could be akin to the thalidomide scandal.
Since undergoing private treatment to remove most of the implant - which Mrs Lee claims has made her incontinence worse, the NHS has paid her £375,000 - but still refuses to accept any wrongdoing.
Speaking for the first time since having the vaginal mesh implant, Mrs Lee, who is registered disabled, has revealed the devastating impact it has had on her life.
'It ruined my life'Mrs Lee, who is reliant on a mobility scooter to get around, said: 'Ten years on, I'm convinced that the so-called "simple" vaginal mesh surgery has ruined my life.
'Luckily, we didn't want any more kids, but I don't feel like proper mum to Charlie. I can only do the school run a few times a week and then, he has to walk alongside me in my mobility scooter.
'I can't play with him like other mums and I don't feel like much of a wife either.
Mrs Lee added: 'My poor husband, Gordon, was more like my carer. As for sex, it was strictly out of bounds because of the pain.
'I even suggested he could sleep with someone else. Luckily, he refused, saying it was me he loved.'She said the money 'doesn't make up' for eight years she has 'lost' since having the procedure.
Registered disabled
Mrs Lee added: 'I'm now registered disabled, unemployed and can't even go out for drinks with my girlfriends.'
Experiencing severe morning sickness and incontinence throughout her pregnancy, Mrs Lee was keen to return to work after having Charlie.
She was the main breadwinner, while husband Mr Lee, who works in web support, stayed at home to look after their son.
But the lecturer at Huddersfield University was mortified when her incontinence became so unmanageable that she wet herself at work.
Ashamed and humiliated
Recalling the incident, she said: 'I was so ashamed and humiliated. I'd gone back to work, six months after having Charlie, but I was still wetting myself.
'On this occasion, as I marched across the campus, I felt a rush between my legs. I'd wet myself and it had soaked right through the pad I'd been wearing.
'I was only 33, but I felt like a granny. I even had to ask a colleague to buy me some new tights, although I was too embarrassed to tell her why.'
Following her humiliating incident at work, Mrs Lee - who also has a daughter, Tash, 21, from a previous relationship – saw her GP.
He referred her to a gynaecologist at Calderdale Royal Hospital, part of Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust.
Mrs Lee, who was planning to study for a PhD, was told she had stress incontinence and had a minor prolapse, which was affecting her bladder control.
Wetting herself at work
She said: 'I was fine when I had Tash, but with Charlie, I lost count of the times I wet myself when I was pregnant.
'Afterwards, though, it got worse and worse. Wetting myself at work was the final straw.'
When she was offered vaginal mesh surgery – a net-like implant used to treat pelvic organ prolapse and incontinence after childbirth – she jumped at the chance.
She was told it was a simple 20-minute procedure and, if it ended the misery of her incontinence, would transform her life.The surgery was scheduled for December 2, 2009 at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary – two weeks after her wedding.
A delayed honeymoon
The couple, who had known each other for 22 years, decided not have a honeymoon until after the operation.
With her surgery imminent, Mrs Lee felt like everything in her life was falling into place - until disaster struck.
When she woke from the anaesthetic she experienced an intense burning pain, starting in her left groin and spreading to the right side.
She said: 'I was in crippling pain, unable to walk or stand properly.'
Given painkillers, she assumed this must be normal after surgery. Discharged that day, she was told to rest for six weeks.
The pain never went away
However, the pain never went away. She said: 'Despite spending days in bed, the pain was still as intense and debilitating for years after.'
In March 2010, she returned to work, but claims, while the incontinence was cured, she could barely walk, because of the burning feeling in her groin.
Referred back to Huddersfield Royal Infirmary by her GP, she was told the mesh implant could take a year to settle.
As her pain persisted for the next few years, Mrs Lee researched and discovered some could cut into the vagina, causing severe discomfort.
She said: 'By September 2011 – two years after the operation - I couldn't even sit down because of the pain.'Finally, at the end of 2012, I was referred to another hospital in Leeds for steroid injections and a Vaginal Wall Prolapse Repair - a procedure to repair the sinking of the vaginal wall. Still nothing worked and the pain persisted.'
Forced to retire
By the summer of 2013, Mrs Lee retired because she was too unwell to work. With time on her hands, she continued researching vaginal mesh surgery.
She discovered a Harley Street doctor in London who specialised in removing her type of mesh - but they charged £10,000.
Legal action had already been started against Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust, who run both hospitals Mrs Lee attended.
It agreed to pay the fee, allowing for her to go under the knife to have most of the mesh removed.
Mrs Lee has now joined Sling the Mesh, a campaign group calling for implant operations to be completely banned.
'My life has been turned upside down'
She said: 'I want to help other women like me. Since the operation, my life has been turned upside down. I'm convinced the mesh is the reason why.
'I'm even more incontinent now than I was before. I don't want another child like Charlie seeing their mum go through this.'
Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust's director of nursing, Brendan Brown, said: 'Clearly this has been a distressing experience for Ms Lee.
'We have agreed a settlement out of court and as a result we are unable to comment further on this case.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-4713290/I-told-husband-sleep-else.html
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Mum claims vaginal mesh implant means she can barely walk, work or have regular sex with husband
Jul 20, 2017 | Mirror
By Rosa Mcmahon
Left with severely impaired bladder control after the birth of her second child Cat Lee, 43, even suggested he could sleep with someone else as she was in so much pain
A mum-of-two claims she can no longer have regular sex with her husband because of a vaginal mesh implant fitted to treat her incontinence after childbirth.
Left with severely impaired bladder control after the birth of her second child, Charlie, on September 29, 2007, Cat Lee, 43, even suggested he could sleep with someone else.
Former Huddersfield University lecturer Cat said: "My poor husband, Gordon, was more like my carer. As for sex, it was strictly out of bounds because of the pain.
"I even suggested he could sleep with someone else. Luckily, he refused, saying it was me he loved."
Experiencing severe morning sickness and incontinence throughout her pregnancy, Cat, of Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, was keen to return to work as a visual culture lecturer after having Charlie at Calderdale Royal Hospital, near Halifax.
She was the main breadwinner while Gordon, 46, who works in web support, stayed at home to look after their son.
But Cat was mortified when her incontinence became so unmanageable that she wet herself at work.
"I was so ashamed and humiliated," she said. "I'd gone back to work, six months after having Charlie, but I was still wetting myself.
"On this occasion, as I marched across the campus, I felt a rush between my legs.
"I'd wet myself and it had soaked right through the pad I'd been wearing.
"I was only 33, but I felt like a granny. I even had to ask a colleague to buy me some new tights, although I was too embarrassed to tell her why."
Following her humiliating incident at work, Cat - who also has a daughter, Tash, 21, from a previous relationship – saw her GP.
He referred her to a gynaecologist at Calderdale Royal Hospital, part of Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust.
Cat, who was planning to study for a PhD, was told she had stress incontinence and had a minor prolapse which was affecting her bladder control.
She said: "I was fine when I had Tash, but with Charlie, I lost count of the times I wet myself when I was pregnant.
"Afterwards, though it got worse and worse. Wetting myself at work was the final straw."
When she was offered vaginal mesh surgery – a net-like implant used to treat pelvic organ prolapse and incontinence after childbirth – she jumped at the chance.
She recalled: "I was told it was a 20-minute procedure and, if it ended the misery of incontinence, it would transform my life.
"It was a type called TVTO, or Tension-Free Vaginal Tape Obturator."
The surgery was scheduled for December 2, 2009 at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary – two weeks after her wedding to Gordon, at Todmorden Town Hall, near their Hebden Bridge home.
She said: "Gordon and I had known each other for 22 years and he'd proposed five years earlier at a local train station. He was my soul mate, so there'd been no rush to get married.
"We were married on November 21, 2009 and it was a perfect day.
"Charlie was an adorable page boy, while I felt like a Hollywood siren, in a silky burgundy gown.
"We decided not to have a honeymoon until after the operation, when, hopefully, we'd go somewhere I could swim in the sea."
With her surgery imminent Cat felt like everything in her life was falling into place.
But when she woke from the anaesthetic on December 2, 2009, she experienced an intense burning, acid-like pain, starting in the left of her groin and spreading to the right side.
Given painkillers, she thought this must be normal after surgery and was discharged that day and told to rest for six weeks.
Sadly, though, according to Cat, the pain never went away.
She said: "Despite spending days in bed, the pain was still as intense and debilitating for years after."
In March 2010 she returned to work but claims that while the incontinence was cured she could barely walk because of the burning feeling in her groin.
"I was in crippling pain, unable to walk or stand properly," she said.
Referred back to Huddersfield Royal Infirmary by her GP, she was told the implant could take a year to settle.
As her pain persisted for the next few years, Cat researched the mesh implant and claims she discovered that some could cut into the vagina, causing severe discomfort.
She said: "By September 2011 – two years after the operation - I couldn't even sit down because of the pain.
"Finally, at the end of 2012, I was referred to another hospital in Leeds for steroid injections and a Vaginal Wall Prolapse Repair - a procedure to repair the sinking of the vaginal wall. Still nothing worked and the pain persisted."
By the summer of 2013, at her wits' end, Cat retired because she was too unwell to work but continued researching vaginal mesh surgery.
"I discovered a Harley Street doctor in London, who specialised in removing my type of mesh, for £10,000," she recalled.
"We'd already started legal action against Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust, who run both Calderdale Royal Hospital and Huddersfield Royal Infirmary, so they agreed to pay the money as an interim payment and I went under the knife."
Despite the doctor removing most of the mesh, Cat, who now uses a mobility scooter, claims the pain remains severe.
"Ten years on, I'm convinced that the so-called 'simple' vaginal mesh surgery has ruined my life," she continued.
"Luckily, we didn't want any more kids, but I don't feel like proper mum to Charlie.
"I can only do the school run a few times a week and then, he has to walk alongside me in my mobility scooter.
"I can't play with him like other mums and I don't feel like much of a wife either."
Cat claims all the surgery has also made her incontinence worse.
"I'm even more incontinent now than I was before," she despaired.
"This year, Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust settled our legal claim, without admitting liability, paying me £375,000, minus the £10,000 for the Harley Street op.
"But that doesn't make up for eight years I have lost.
"I'm now registered disabled, unemployed and can't even go out for drinks with my girlfriends. "
Cat says other women have also complained to either the NHS or the device manufacturer about problems with the mesh implant. She has now joined the Sling the Mesh campaign, calling for implant operations to be stopped.
"I want to help other women like me," she added. "Since the operation my life has been turned upside down. I'm convinced the mesh is the reason why.
"I don't want another child like Charlie seeing their mum go through this."
Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust's director of Nursing, Brendan Brown, said: "Clearly this has been a distressing experience for Ms Lee. We have agreed a settlement out of court and as a result we are unable to comment further on this case."
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/mum-claims-vaginal-mesh-implant-10835736
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Wife told husband to sleep with other people after vaginal mesh ruined their sex life
Jul 20, 2017 | Metro.co.uk
By Toby Meyjes
A mum-of-two told her husband to have sex with other people after a vaginal mesh operation ruined their sex life.
Cat Lee, 43, has been left using a mobility scooter after the surgery left her in debilitating pain and failed to cure her incontinence.
The former Huddersfield University lecturer has been forced to quit her job and is now calling for implant operations to be stopped.
She underwent an operation in 2009 after the birth of her second child, Charlie, two years earlier left her unable to control her bladder.
But she said the surgery left her in debilitating pain and unable to have sex with her husband, Gordon, 46
‘I even suggested he could sleep with someone else,’ she said. ‘Luckily, he refused, saying it was me he loved.’
Unfortunately, a vaginal wall prolapse repair in 2012 failed to solve the problem and eventually, she resorted to having the mesh removed by a Harley Street doctor.
The £10,000 surgery was paid for by Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust which settled a legal claim for £375,000, without admitting liability.
But Cat said the payout doesn’t make up for the time she has ‘lost’.
‘I’m convinced that the so-called ‘simple’ vaginal mesh surgery has ruined my life,’ she said.
‘Luckily, we didn’t want any more kids, but I don’t feel like a proper mum to Charlie.
‘I can only do the school run a few times a week and then, he has to walk alongside me in my mobility scooter.
‘I can’t play with him like other mums and I don’t feel like much of a wife either.’
Cat is now registered disabled after the surgery made her incontinence worse and she is still in pain.
She has joined the Sling the Mesh campaign calling for the operations to be stopped.
She said: ‘I want to help other women like me. Since the operation, my life has been turned upside down. I’m convinced the mesh is the reason why.
‘I don’t want another child like Charlie seeing their mum go through this.’
Cat’s surgery was carried out at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary.
Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust’s director of Nursing, Brendan Brown, said: ‘Clearly this has been a distressing experience for Ms Lee.
‘We have agreed a settlement out of court and as a result, we are unable to comment further on this case.’
http://metro.co.uk/2017/07/20/wife-told-husband-to-sleep-with-other-people-after-vaginal-mesh-ruined-their-sex-life-6793037/ -
Western Australian pelvic mesh victims criticise government response to scandal
Jul 20, 2017 | Newcastle Herald
By Joanne McCarthy
SUE Turner and Jeanette McKinnon are the Western Australian women implanted with pelvic mesh devices in public hospitals who refuse to be regarded as unfortunate statistics.
They have made submissions to a Federal Parliament Senate inquiry into pelvic mesh – with a public hearing in Perth on August 25 – listing serious, permanent and life-altering consequences of their surgeries more than a decade ago.
They want answers from WA Health Minister Roger Cook about mesh research allegedly conducted in public hospitals, and whether they are included in mesh trials for which they say they did not consent.
They are scathing of Mr Cook’s commitment to “make some enquiries” about the alleged mesh research trials, in response to questions from Fairfax Media, and have called for a full investigation into whether women were used as “mesh guinea pigs” in public health facilities.
“Something awful happened to me in 2004 and 2005 after I had mesh put into me. My world’s just so small now,” said Mrs McKinnon, who was 46 in 2004 when she was implanted with an Australian-developed pelvic mesh device at Bentley Hospital.
“It’s like living in hell. I’m dying a very slow and agonising death.”
Victorian Senator Derryn Hinch in February successfully argued for a Senate inquiry into how some pelvic mesh devices for women’s incontinence and prolapse problems after childbirth were cleared for use in Australia over the past two decades. He compared pelvic mesh products to Thalidomide, the drug that led to birth defects in babies in the 1960s.
The aggressive marketing of many mesh devices in Australia from 2003, without sufficient evidence of their safety and efficacy, led to “one of the greatest medical scandals and abuses of mothers in Australia's history,” Senator Hinch said in a speech to Parliament.
Nearly 200 Western Australian women have responded to a survey conducted by Victorian consumer health advocacy group, Health Issues Centre, for a submission to the inquiry representing the experiences of more than 2200 Australian women implanted with pelvic mesh devices.
More than 700 women are part of a current class action against major pelvic mesh manufacturer, Johnson & Johnson, in the Federal Court in Sydney.
Sue Turner, of Perth, has sought legal advice about a class action against an Australian manufacturing company, after she was implanted with an Australian-developed pelvic mesh device at Armadale Hospital in 2007.
I was never told the device was high risk. I was never told about trials. I would never have consented to being part of a trial.- Sue Turner, who had pelvic mesh surgery in 2007.
“I had a prolapse. I just trusted the doctor and our health system when he told me it would be a pretty easy fix,” Mrs Turner said.
“I was never told the device was high risk. I was never told about trials. I would never have consented to being part of a trial. If I was told there was a risk that if things went wrong I would never have a sex life again, or live a life of sometimes unendurable pain, or be left with mesh and anchors in my body that have moved and embedded into tissue very close to major blood vessels and nerves, I would never have consented. But I wasn’t told.”
In a statement to Fairfax Media Mr Cook said he would ask the Department of Health to “make some enquiries into the research undertaken, and the cases where the implants have been used”, after two senior Western Australian doctors released a series of papers from 2005 about trials in Western Australian public and private hospitals, including Armadale Hospital, using the Australian-developed pelvic mesh device.
In a statement by a WA Health Department unit, Fairfax Media was advised there are no records of research approvals for trials involving surgery on women at public hospitals using the Australian-developed pelvic mesh device.
Mrs Turner and Perth-based Australian Pelvic Mesh Support Group founder Caz Chisholm were angered by Mr Cook’s statements that the “WA Government understands the concern this has caused for some patients”, but “there have been very few complaints received by WA Health and the Health and Disability Complaints Office”.
“What are we? Guinea pigs?” Mrs Turner said.
“I want this stuff out of my body but my doctor’s told me the surgery could be life-threatening. This isn’t about numbers. It’s about how our health system allowed these devices onto the market, and how these doctors were allowed to do this surgery in public hospitals without telling us of the risks.”
Ms Chisholm said the lack of complaints was a consequence of women being told for years that their chronic problems, including often debilitating pain, repeated serious infections, and erosion of mesh into organs including the bladder and bowel, were not linked to mesh surgery, or not being told they were implanted with mesh.
Many women who have presented to their doctors with pain and complications have been told it is not the mesh that is the cause.- Australian Pelvic Mesh Support Group founder Caz Chisholm
“Many women who have presented to their doctors with pain and complications have been told it is not the mesh that is the cause. It is only because of recent media attention about stories of women's pain and complications that women are realising their own complications are identical to the media stories,” Ms Chisholm said.
“The minister says there have been very few complaints by women, but what about the doctors treating the women? Obviously doctors aren’t reporting complications either, and are they supposed to?”
Mrs McKinnon has spent more than a decade on antibiotics.
“I came out of hospital not very well in 2004 and had my first urinary tract infection shortly after that. Then it was one urinary tract infection after another. If I come off the antibiotics I get a urinary tract infection,” she said.
She had another four major surgeries over the following year to relieve the pain and address mesh erosion into organs.
In 2009 Mrs McKinnon was diagnosed with the auto immune condition lupus, requiring steroid treatment.
“I was normal, healthy and fit before I had that surgery. I’m only 59 and I feel like a 100-year-old. I thought all these years it was just me. It’s just the nightmare that you live.”
In a statement in June the Royal Australian College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists said the majority of women treated with mesh for incontinence or prolapse had “a good long-term result” but “in a small number of cases the complications have been very serious”.
In a submission to the Senate inquiry Victoria’s Health Issues Centre chief executive Danny Vadasz has criticised mesh debate “framed in terms of the good outcomes of the many outweighing the unfortunate experiences of a few”.
“Our health system is built on values such as equity and a universal duty of care, not on a cost/benefit analysis that accepts the unavoidability of collateral damage,” he said, in a Health Issues Centre submission arguing Australian regulators have been “asleep at the wheel” on pelvic mesh.
http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4804268/its-like-living-in-hell/
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Woman Left Disabled By Vaginal Mesh Implant (Photos)
Jul 20, 2017 | Opposing Views
By Michael Howard
A married English woman with two children can no longer have sex with her husband due to a vaginal mesh implant that left her unable to walk.
Cat Lee, 43, had the procedure done to treat the incontinence she was suffering from as a result of giving birth to her second child.
Instead, the implant "ruined her life."
Now bound to a scooter, Lee spoke to the Daily Mail about her nightmare experience.
"Luckily, we didn't want any more kids, but I don't feel like [a] proper mom to Charlie," she said. "I can only do the school run a few times a week, and then he has to walk alongside me in my mobility scooter. I can't play with him like other moms and I don't feel like much of a wife either."
The pain caused by the implant was so extreme that she and her husband were forced to stop having sex.
"My poor husband, Gordon, was more like my [caregiver]," she explained. "As for sex, it was strictly out of bounds because of the pain. I even suggested he could sleep with someone else. Luckily he refused, saying it was me he loved."
The decision to get the mesh implant came after an embarrassing incident at Huddersfield University, where she worked as a lecturer.
Lee said she was walking across campus when, unable to control her bladder, she wet herself.
"On this occasion, as I marched across the campus, I felt a rush between my legs," she recalled. "I'd wet myself and it had soaked right through the pad I'd been wearing."
"I was so ashamed and humiliated," she added. "I'd gone back to work, six months after having Charlie, but I was still wetting myself. I was only 33, but I felt like a granny. I even had to ask a colleague to buy me some new tights, although I was too embarrassed to tell her why."
A gynecologist explained to her that she was suffering from stress incontinence and a minor prolapse, and suggested that she have vaginal mesh surgery -- a simple 20-minute procedure.
Lee underwent the operation two weeks after her wedding. As soon as she woke up she could feel that something was wrong.
"I was in crippling pain, unable to walk or stand properly," she said.
Her doctor gave her painkillers and told her to rest for six weeks, but the pain never subsided.
"By September 2011 -- two years after the operation -- I couldn't even sit down because of the pain," she said. "Finally, at the end of 2012, I was referred to another hospital in Leeds for steroid injections and a Vaginal Wall Prolapse Repair -- a procedure to repair the sinking of the vaginal wall. Still nothing worked and the pain persisted."
Lee gave up trying to work -- the pain was too much. In her free time she began researching vaginal mesh implants and learned that the mesh could tear into the vagina, resulting in severe and chronic pain.
She filed lawsuits against the medical companies that were involved with her surgery and received $435,000, some of which she used to pay for another procedure to remove most of the mesh.
Lee has since joined Sling the Mesh, an advocacy group that campaigns to have vaginal mesh implants banned completely.
"I want to help other women like me," she said. "Since the operation, my life has been turned upside down. I'm convinced the mesh is the reason why."
In April, the BBC reported that over 800 women in the UK were taking legal action against the National Health Service and the manufacturers of vaginal mesh implants.
More than 92,000 UK women had vaginal mesh implants between 2007 and 2015. Roughly one in 11 women experienced issues after the procedure.
http://www.opposingviews.com/i/society/woman-can-no-longer-have-sex-after-being-fitted-controversial-vaginal-mesh-implant
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