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Ethicon Media Monitoring 1/10/2018
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Whistle blower lifts lid on surgeons who tell patients they do not use the scandal-hit vaginal mesh implants
Jan 10, 2018 | Cambs Times
By Kath Sansom
Surgeons are denying they use vaginal mesh implants, in a trend being seen in hospitals across Britain, where women are assured the mesh scandal is just “media hype”. -
Vaginal Mesh Injury 2018 Update
Jan 10, 2018 | The Legal Examiner
By Shezad Malik
Vaginal Mesh Injury 2018 Update. As the tumultuous year of 2017 recedes into the trash can of history, becoming a mere memory, I am providing this timely update regarding the status of Vaginal Mesh Injury claims.
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Online Sources
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Jan 10, 2018 | Cambs Times
By Kath Sansom
Surgeons are denying they use vaginal mesh implants, in a trend being seen in hospitals across Britain, where women are assured the mesh scandal is just “media hype”.
As the scandal escalates into what is being called the biggest women’s health disaster since thalidomide, some patients are being told their local hospital doesn’t use mesh, it uses tape.
Campaigners say this is a bold play on words that hinges on the details of official wording in NHS paperwork.
The news comes amid a survey by campaign group Sling The Mesh which shows 83 per cent of women say they were not fully warned of risks or told they were having a permanent polypropylene plastic implant.
Ruth Turner, a mum of two from Blackpool, agreed to speak out to blow the whistle on the “simple gold standard fix” after her surgeon said women were jumping on the bandwagon of problems seen in America.
Ruth, 57, who works as an advocacy manager for deaf people, said: “My surgeon insisted he didn’t use mesh he was going to use a TVT tape made of polypropylene.
“It wasn’t until I joined Sling The Mesh I realised tape and mesh are the same thing and that polypropylene is plastic!”
She had a consultation in August last year but by October had seen press coverage so called her surgeons’ secretary to discuss it.
“She read a statement over the phone and insisted women were panicking with no good reason because it’s only the American mesh that causes problems.
“I was told he used tape not mesh and it wasn’t anything to do with the media hype and that women were missing out on a good treatment option.
“Had I not done my research and seen women with catastrophic, life changing pain, injuries and complications I would have been reassured and gone ahead and booked the operation.
“Luckily I cancelled. I dodged a bullet. There’s no way of telling who will suffer.
“Being a member of Sling The Mesh has shown me it’s nothing to do with age or build or if you have blue eyes or brown eyes or any other random reason.
“Nobody knows why, it’s Russian Roulette. It breaks my heart to see the terrible problems women are suffering, some with stomas, bladders removed, giving up work, losing their hobbies, in chronic pain.
“My active lifestyle defines who I am, I run and cycle, we are a really fit and active family. Had I lost all that over a simple operation I have no idea what I would have done.
“I would rather live with the problem than risk losing my quality of life.”
Official NHS coding calls incontinence mesh “introduction of a tension free vaginal tape”.
The word mesh is not used in paperwork so surgeons see this as a green light to deny they use it.
Campaigners say this is unethical.
Jackie Harvey,a campaigner from Northern Ireland, said: “The surgeon I saw in 2015 told me that my mesh wasn’t the same as the one in America that was causing all the issues.
“We see it time and again in groups globally that surgeons deny they use mesh, they are using tape - yet a TVT or TVTO tape is made of mesh. And that mesh is made of polypropylene, another word for plastic.
“It is a play on words.
“To deny they use the mesh in the media is arrogant and breaches trust. It breaks ethics under the Montgomery Ruling.”
• We contacted the media teams at Blackpool Victoria Hospital and the Royal College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (RCOG) but have not received a response.
• There are almost 6,000 NHS surgeons working in obstetrics and gynaecology in the UK made up of:
- Consultants 44 per cent = 2,686
- Speciality doctors 25 per cent = 1,500
- Trainees 31 per cent = 1,858
• RCOG has 1,550 surgeon members in England, 65 in Northern Ireland, 150 in Scotland and 70 in Wales.
http://www.cambstimes.co.uk/news/sling-the-mesh-vaginal-surgeons-tape-rcog-1-5348722
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Vaginal Mesh Injury 2018 Update
Jan 10, 2018 | The Legal Examiner
By Shezad Malik
Vaginal Mesh Injury 2018 Update. As the tumultuous year of 2017 recedes into the trash can of history, becoming a mere memory, I am providing this timely update regarding the status of Vaginal Mesh Injury claims.
Over 200,000 Vaginal Mesh Injury claims
There have been over 200,000 injury claims over the use of vaginal mesh nationwide in both federal and state court actions. We have been involved in this product liability litigation in no small part over the past six years.
And we continue to get inquiries from injured women who have been implanted with these mesh devices for treatment of their stress urinary incontinence or pelvic organ prolapse.
Case in point, earlier in 2017 a woman reached out to us requesting help to deal with the injuries caused by the plastic mesh device. Ms. Smith (name changed to protect identity) had undergone vaginal mesh treatment for stress urinary incontinence and pelvic organ prolapse in 2007. She had a hysterectomy for the pelvic organ prolapse but had developed severe urinary incontinence as a complication.
Over the next ten years, she suffered from vaginal mesh complications, including frequent bladder infections, mesh erosion and incapacitating pelvic pain. Finally, after trying multiple rounds of conservative therapies she underwent invasive surgery to remove the disintegrating plastic mesh and have complicated pelvic reconstructive surgery.
Vaginal Mesh Injury 2018 Update
The plastic surgical vaginal mesh is linked to serious design defects causing devastating complications including recurrent infections, mesh erosion into the vagina and vital organ perforation.
The Vaginal Mesh litigation had been brewing since 2010, and the number of injury claims exploded in 2011 when the FDA announced that it had received thousands of adverse event reports involving injury complications with vaginal mesh products between 2008 and 2010.
FDA “No Evidence of Additional Benefit”
The FDA has found that there was no evidence that transvaginal mesh provides any additional benefits when compared to more traditional surgery for treatment of pelvic organ prolapse.
In 2012, the FDA sent a letter to the mesh manufacturers, ordering that they conduct additional studies and trials to evaluate the safety of transvaginal mesh devices and determine if they pose an unreasonable risk of injury for women.
In 2016, the FDA labeled the vaginal mesh devices as “HIGH RISK.”
Faced with the intense medical trial scrutiny, many mesh manufacturers elected to stop making the devices to avoid the need to spend money studying the safety of products they have sold for years. Obviously, they knew or should have known that the devices were of limited benefit and exposed the patients to major complications.
Vaginal Mesh Settlements
Following litigation over the past six years, different manufacturers have reached vaginal mesh settlements to dismiss groups of claims involving side effects with plastic vaginal mesh products made by Endo’s AMS, C.R. Bard, Boston Scientific, Coloplast, Ethicon and others.
http://fortworth.legalexaminer.com/defective-dangerous-products/vaginal-mesh-injury/
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