A new Benicar HCT lawsuit accuses the drug’s manufacturers of failing to warn about possible gastrointestinal injuries and kidney failure.

Plaintiff Sharon T. says she took Benicar and Benicar HCT starting around April 2006. She claims that as a result of that medication, she suffered severe gastrointestinal injuries and kidney failure.

Sharon is now bringing claims against Daiichi Sankyo and Forest Laboratories, both companies involved in the manufacture and promotion of Benicar. Her Benicar HCT lawsuit raises several different common law claims and a claim for violation of New Jersey’s Product Liability Act.

Benicar HCT Lawsuit Joins Similar Claims

Sharon filed her Benicar HCT lawsuit as part of a large multidistrict litigation consisting of over a thousand similar claims funneled into a single federal court.

This MDL was organized in April 2015 when the federal Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation transferred 15 existing lawsuits into the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.

As of April 2016, there were over 1,200 similar claims in the MDL, all pending before U.S. District Judge Robert B. Kugler.

Benicar and Benicar HCT are two brand-name drugs based on the active ingredient olmesartan, a medication used to treat high blood pressure. Benicar HCT combines olmesartan with hydrochlorothiazide, another hypertension treatment.

Olmesartan is also the active ingredient in brand-name drugs Azor and Tribenzor. According to plaintiffs in the Benicar MDL, manufacturer Daiichi Sankyo refers to these four drugs as the “Benicar Family.”

Generally, the MDL plaintiffs are patients who after taking olmesartan-based drugs suffered gastrointestinal symptoms in a pattern known as sprue-like enteropathy, a condition with symptoms that may resemble those of celiac disease.

The characteristic symptoms of sprue-like enteropathy are severe and include chronic diarrhea with excessive weight loss. According to an FDA warning issued in July 2013, this condition may develop months or years after starting to take olmesartan.

The FDA noted that in a review of its adverse event reporting system, it found 23 serious cases of sprue-like enteropathy in patients taking Benicar or related drugs.

According to this Benicar HCT lawsuit, Some of these patients were suffering from villous atrophy, a condition in which the villi inside the intestines degrade.

All these patients’ symptoms improved once they stopped taking olmesartan, the agency said. The agency said that this evidence from its own adverse event database plus more from other sources provided clear evidence of an association between olmesartan and sprue-like enteropathy.

The MDL plaintiffs allege that defendants Daiichi Sankyo and Forest Laboratories knew or should have known about these problems.

They claim that in addition to the FDA report database, studies published in scientific journals showed a possible association between olmesartan and the risk of severe gastrointestinal symptoms.

The plaintiffs in this Benicar HCT lawsuit also cite several published case reports in which patients suffering from sprue-like enteropathy lost significant amounts of weight while suffering from chronic diarrhea.

But despite the availability of these reports, the plaintiffs say, the defendants failed to issue warnings adequate to put the medical community or the general public on notice of the possible risks.

Had the defendants provided proper warnings, the plaintiffs say they would have had a chance to avoid the risk of developing sprue-like enteropathy.

The Benicar HCT Lawsuit is filed within In re: Benicar (Olmesartan) Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2606 in teh U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, Camden Vicinage.