Taxotere has unwarned side effects, according to a cancer survivor who struggled with hair not growing back after chemo.

Plaintiff Valerie O. was reportedly treated with Taxotere, Docefrez, docetaxel, and other related chemotherapy agents from February 2013 to May 2014. She reportedly experienced her hair not growing back after chemo treatment, which she blames on the use of docetaxel drugs.

Taxotere (docetaxel) is a chemotherapy agent approved for the treatment of breast cancer, non-small cell lung cancer, advanced stomach cancer, head and neck cancer, and metastatic prostate cancer. The drug is part of a class of medications known as taxanes which are derived from yew trees. These medications stop the spread of cancer by over stabilizing the cell and preventing cell division.

Although this makes the drug an effective treatment for cancer, Taxotere and other docetaxel medications reportedly can cause permanent hair loss. Hair follicles are some of the fastest dividing healthy cells in the body, meaning that they may be targeted by chemotherapy agents that target rapidly dividing cancer cells. Most hair loss from chemotherapy is temporary, but the hair loss after treatment with Taxotere can allegedly be permanent.

“Plaintiffs are women who were diagnosed with breast cancer, underwent chemotherapy using Taxotere, Docetaxel Injection, Docetaxel Injection Concentrate, and/or Docefrez, and now suffer from permanent hair loss, a side effect for which they were not warned and were wholly unprepared,” the Taxotere hair loss consolidated lawsuit claims. “As a result of this undisclosed side effect, Plaintiffs have struggled to return to normalcy, even after surviving cancer because an integral element of their identities, their hair, never returned.”

Despite several studies reportedly documenting the risks of hair loss with Taxotere, patients were allegedly not warned about the risks for many years. Instead, the chemotherapy agent was allegedly portrayed as safe and effective.

“During Defendants’ sales representatives and marketing agents communications with healthcare providers, they made statements, comments, and express suggestions that the risk of permanent hair loss associated with Taxotere use was on higher than its competitor’s alternatives,” Valerie claims in her suit.

These representations allegedly caused the public, including Valerie and her doctor, to believe that hair not growing back after chemo was not an elevated risk of hair not growing back after chemo.

Valerie aims to hold the drug manufacturers, including Sanofi-Aventis, Sandoz, McKesson, Pfizer, and more, accountable for allegedly failing to warn their consumers about the risks for permanent hair loss with Taxotere, Docefrez, and other docetaxel drugs.

While warnings about Taxotere hair loss were required on labeling in Europe and Canada in 2005, warnings for the same problems were reportedly not added to U.S. labels until a full decade later. Even now, Drug Safety News reports that the warnings on U.S. labels are vague and state that hair loss from Taxotere “generally regrows”.

The Taxotere Lawsuit is Case No. 2:18-cv-14300-JTM-MBN and is part of the Taxotere MDL, In re: Taxotere (docetaxel) Products Liability Litigation, Case No. 2:16-md-02740-KDE-MBN, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.