A Utah woman has filed a Xarelto bleeding injuries lawsuit against the blood thinning drug manufacturer, Janssen Pharmaceuticals.

Plaintiff Aurora S. began taking Xarelto to treat her atrial fibrillation. According to this Xarelto bleeding injuries lawsuit, she began taking Xarelto in August 2015 and continued taking it until March 2016.

However, on Sept. 1, 2015, Aurora suffered acute hematuria and as a result, suffered Xarelto bleeding injuries. Acute hematuria is a condition in which blood is in the urine and is often a sign of bleeding elsewhere in the body or infection.

Aurora alleges she suffered a life-threatening bleed and, according to her Xarelto bleeding injuries lawsuit, “was caused to sustain severe and permanent personal injuries, pain, suffering, and emotional distress.”

She claims that she suffered serious and dangerous side effects from the drug, “as well as other severe and personal injuries which are permanent and lasting in nature, physical pain and mental anguish, including, diminished enjoyment of life, expenses for hospitalization and medical treatment, and loss of earnings.”

The Nature of Xarelto Bleeding Injuries

Xarelto is a blood thinning medication that has been in the middle of a great number of lawsuits in which plaintiffs allege that Xarelto use resulted in life-threatening bleeding events that could have been avoided.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Xarelto in July 2011 to prevent deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pulmonary embolism (PE). It joined a group of newer anticoagulants that relied on a different method of preventing blood clots than previous medications.

Less than one year after the FDA approved Xarelto, reports of Xarelto bleeding injuries began streaming into the FDA. As early as June 2012, over one thousand reports of Xarelto bleeding injuries were reported and in that group, sixty-five were fatalities.

By the end of that year, the number of Xarelto bleeding injuries reports had risen to 2,000, including 151 deaths.

One of the problems with Xarelto is that it does not have a bleeding antidote available. The standard anticoagulant used generally before Xarelto and other new anticoagulants reached the market was warfarin. Xarelto was marketed as superior to warfarin because patients did not need as frequent monitoring and did not need to change their diet.

However, as is the case with any blood thinning medication, the risk of excessive bleeding exists. Patients who take warfarin, in the case of an excessive bleeding event, need only to be administered vitamin K. Vitamin K can reverse the effects of warfarin in a patient who is experiencing bleeding complications.

Without an approved antidote, Xarelto patients are at risk for life-threatening Xarelto bleeding injuries. If a Xarelto patient is injured in an accident or suffers some other type of emergency bleeding situation, there is no antidote to reverse the effects of the blood thinning medication. This can make the difference between life and death.

Xarelto users have complained that the drug they are taking is unsafe and that Janssen knew about the risks, yet did nothing to warn or help patients.

This Xarelto Bleeding Injuries Lawsuit is Case No. 2:17-cv-08137-EEF-MBN in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.