A Texas man filed an Actos bladder cancer lawsuit against Takeda Pharmaceuticals alleging that he developed the cancer as a result of using the diabetes medication.

Plaintiff Arthur Jackson was prescribed Actos by his physician, and had agreed to take it after hearing of its fast treatment mechanism, according to his Actos lawsuit. As a type-2 diabetes patient, Actos had been prescribed to Jackson to help control his blood sugar levels and regulate insulin production, both of which are vital in preventing diabetic attack.

Jackson was prescribed Actos in 2009 and stayed on the medication until 2012, when he was diagnosed with bladder cancer. The Actos bladder cancer lawsuit was filed after Jackson learned Actos was strongly associated with bladder cancer. According to his Actos lawsuit, Jackson said he was not aware of the connection between bladder cancer and Actos, and could find no warning of that on the drug’s label. Jackson said he never would have agreed to take Actos if he had known about the possibility of bladder cancer.

The Actos lawsuit accuses Takeda Pharmaceuticals of negligence, false advertising, concealing information, and misrepresenting a product.

The Actos Bladder Cancer Lawsuit is In Re: Actos Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2299, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of California.

Overview of Actos Complications

Actos was approved by the FDA in July 1999 to be a type-2 diabetes treatment drug, and was jointly released in the United States by Takeda Pharmaceuticals and Eli Lilly & Company. While Actos is very popular with patients, doctors typically only prescribe it as an alternative medication due to its aggressive treatment mechanism.

Actos is a part of an insulin-sensitizing diabetes drug family called thiazolidinediones (TZDs), meaning that this drug only works in the presence of insulin. Due to the fact that insulin is vital for the body’s metabolic process, a variety of diabetic treatment medications have been manufactured to help type-2 diabetes patients to manage their insulin production.

According to a 2005 study called PROactive (PROspective PioglitAzone Clinical Trial In MacroVascular Events), Actos patients were shown to likely to develop bladder cancer. While the three-year study had been originally conducted to observe cardiac complications, the researchers found that bladder cancer was a much bigger concern. This information was not originally released to the public, and had only been discovered during the litigation.

It was also discovered that Takeda had conducted in-house preclinical trials of Actos, and found that mice had developed bladder cancer after being exposed. This study was not included on the drug’s warning label, nor has Takeda ever admitted to the association.