Jury deciding if pain patch leaked, killing man, 28
By JANE MUSGRAVE
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
WEST PALM BEACH — Having
survived a horrific car accident, Adam Hendelson
was killed by medicine that was supposed to help
him deal with lingering pain, a federal jury
was told Monday.
Instead of releasing a small amount of a powerful
drug into his system to deaden his pain, (
Duragesic
pain patch) produced by pharmaceutical giant
Johnson & Johnson leaked,
delivering a fatal dose to the 28-year-old Deerfield
Beach resident,
attorney
Jim Orr said during
his closing arguments in U.S. District Court.
"Clearly this patch did not perform as
designed because it killed Adam Hendelson," Orr
said. "It definitely malfunctioned."
Lee Hendelson of West Palm Beach should be awarded
millions for the loss of his son, Orr said.
"Millions of dollars would be appropriate," said
the attorney from Dallas. "Whether it's
$5 million or $3 million or $10 million, that's
in your hands."
Attorneys representing
Alza
Corp., a subsidiary
of the Cincinnati-based company, countered that
Hendelson's 2003 death was a tragic accident.
But, they said throughout the two-week trial,
it can't be blamed on the patch, which they claimed
millions have used without ill effect.
Miami attorney William Upshaw told the jury
of six women and two men that Hendelson overdosed
on the combination of drugs he was taking, not
because the Duragesic patch leaked.
In addition to the patch, which contained fentanyl,
a painkiller 100 times more potent than morphine,
Hendelson was taking antidepressants. It proved
to be a deadly combination, Upshaw said, referring
to an autopsy report by Broward County's medical
examiner.
"He was a man in pain," Upshaw said
of Hendelson who shattered his hip in a 1996
traffic accident and was struggling to deal with
the effects. "What happened to Mr. Hendelson
was not a defective patch, it was a mistake in
his medication."
Concern about the safety of the patch spurred
the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2005
to issue a public health advisory, requiring
manufacturers to include detailed product safety
information with the medication and to alert
doctors of the dangers of using the fentanyl
patch in combination with other drugs.
A jury in Houston last summer became what was
believed the first in the nation to find the
patch defective when it ordered Johnson & Johnson
to pay $772,500 to the daughter of a Texas woman
who died after her pain-killing patch leaked.
About 100 similar cases have been filed nationwide.
Like Hendelson, the Texas woman was using the
patch to deal with the pain of injuries she suffered
in a car accident. Like Hendelson, the woman
had highly elevated levels of fentanyl in her
blood system, which Johnson & Johnson attorneys
blamed on "postpartum redistribution."
They offered the same explantion for why Hendelson's
levels were nearly five times above what is considered
safe.
The jury is to resume deliberations this morning.
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