A Nevada woman filed a metal hip implant lawsuit against Biomet, Inc., alleging that its metal hip implant device is defective.

Plaintiff Doris W., a resident of Las Vegas, Nevada, is suing Biomet, Inc. for the injuries she allegedly sustained after having the company’s Biomet M2a Magnum Metal-on-Metal Hip System implanted in both her right hip and her left hip.

Doris claims that the Biomet metal-on-metal hip implant suffers from defects that can cause excessive amounts of metal to corrode from the surfaces of its various parts. This metal corrosion causes the hip implant to fail and the surrounding tissue and bone to die, necessitating surgery to remove and replace the defective metal-on-metal hip implant.

These defects, Doris alleges, result in an unreasonably high risk of failure for the M2a Magnum Hip System.

Doris underwent a right hip replacement surgery in 2006, and a left hip replacement surgery in 2009. Despite prior complaints of adverse effects associated with their product, Biomet represented the M2a Magnum Hip System as safe and effective to Doris’s surgeon and to Doris herself. Doris claims that, had Biomet not made these misrepresentations, her surgeon would not have used the M2a Magnum Hip System for either of her hip replacement surgeries and she would not have suffered the injuries she did.

Doris had to undergo surgery in March of 2015 to replace the metal-on-metal system that failed in her right hip. She is at risk of having to undergo revision surgery on the metal-on-metal hip implant in her left hip as well.

This failed hip replacement means that Wright is now at an even greater risk of suffering from hip dislocation, as studies have reported that hip replacement patients who have undergone revision surgery are nearly four times more likely to suffer from hip dislocation.

Doris’s metal-on-metal hip implant lawsuit brings multiple counts against Biomet, including product liability, negligence, and violation of Nevada’s Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law.

Biomet Metal-on-Metal Hip Implant Systems

The M2a Magnum Hip System, and other metal-on-metal hip implant systems like it, were developed in order to effectively reconstruct human hip joints. These joints may need implants because of conditions such as osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, avascular necrosis, and/or fracture.

While most hip implants have metal balls fixed on top of a femoral stem implanted on the femur and then placed inside plastic liner and an acetabular shell, the M2a Magnum Hip System’s design places the metal ball directly in contact with another metal piece, the metal acetabular shell. This design was never approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as safe or effective.

Doris’s Biomet suit alleges that, on numerous occasions, Biomet representatives met with orthopedic surgeons across the United States and defended the M2a Magnum Hip Implant as safe, as well as the best product on the market. Biomet continued to claim in these meetings that Biomet M2a Magnum Hip Implants had an excellent track record and a low and acceptable failure rate. These defenses continued even after they became aware of the numerous complications with their system.

Biomet has issued no warnings about the risks or the failures that have been reported to them. In fact, Biomet has marketed the product as providing a “greater resistance to dislocation and improved implant stability,” though reports and studies have indicated the opposite to be true.

If you have experienced complications due to a metal-on-metal hip implant from Biomet or another company, you may be able to file a lawsuit.

The Biomet Metal Hip Lawsuit is Case No. 3.15-cv-00357, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana, South Bend Division.