Pharmaceutical giants Bayer and Janssen Pharmaceuticals are facing another Xarelto lawsuit from a patient alleging severe gastrointestinal bleeding.

Arizona plaintiff Peggy D. had been prescribed Xarelto on Sept. 30, 2013, but had only stayed on the drug for a little over two months.

On Dec. 3, 2013, Peggy was hospitalized for severe gastrointestinal bleeding, iatrogenic coagulpathy, and anemia allegedly as a result of taking Xarelto.

Peggy received several blood transfusions to restore her red blood cell count. Throughout her time on Xarelto, Peggy insists she never would have taken the drug if she had known the risks of Xarelto bleeding.

Overview of Xarelto Bleeding Complications

Xarelto is part of the new generation anticoagulant medication group, which is a set of drugs meant to directly compete with Warfarin. Before the release of Pradaxa in 2010, there had not been any blood-thinner released since Warfarin in 1954.

Pradaxa’s German manufacturer Boehringer Ingelheim had been met with great success, which spurred American pharmaceutical companies to try their luck in the anticoagulant market.

Bayer and Janssen were the first to do this with the release of Xarelto, which was followed by Pfizer’s and Bristol-Myers Squibb’s release of Eliquis in 2012.

Each of these new generation anticoagulants were advertised as working faster and more efficiently than Warfarin, but they lacked an important safety feature that the older blood thinner came with.

Xarelto does not currently have a reversal agent on the market, in the case of a bleeding event like the one that Peggy suffered. Bayer and Janssen allegedly knew the dangers Xarelto presented, but they to omit this information from the drug’s label.

Peggy is joining a group of plaintiffs alleging similar claims against the drug company, in a multidistrict litigation (MDL). Her Xarelto lawsuit will be consolidated with similar Xarelto lawsuits.

The Xarelto Lawsuit is filed in the larger Xarelto MDL known as In re: Xarelto(Rivaroxaban) Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2592 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.