An Ohio man says he was implanted with defective DePuy metal hip implants that now cause him constant pain.

Plaintiff Danny M. alleges he underwent hip replacement surgery in his left hip in January 2002. He underwent surgery to replace his right hip a few months later in September 2002.

During both surgeries, he alleges, he received metal hip implant parts manufactured by defendant DePuy Orthopedics.

Since those surgeries, Danny alleges he has developed problems in both hips. He says he is in constant pain and has difficulty ambulating, all because of an alleged defect in his DePuy metal hip implants.

Danny alleges the DePuy metal hip parts he received were designed with “an inherently disproportionate propensity for the product to fail due to loosening of the surgically installed product [that] results in metallosis,” a condition in which the body reacts to toxic levels of metal.

Because of this alleged defect, he says, movement of the DePuy implant components causes metal surfaces to rub against each other, releasing particles of chromium and cobalt into the surrounding tissue.

The resulting metallosis can cause death of the surrounding tissue, including bone and muscle tissue. For the patient, that can result in pain, discomfort, and failure of the implant. Patients who suffer from metallosis may end up needing revision surgery to remove their hip implant and repair the damage.

“Patients affected by the product failure must undergo necessary surgical revisions of their total hip replacements and/or other necessary medical care because of infiltrated or contaminated body tissue, organs and fluids,” according to this DePuy hip implant lawsuit.

He says neither he nor his treating physicians were aware of the alleged defect at the time of his surgery.

DePuy Metal Hip Recall

Danny says it wasn’t until sometime in 2016 that he found out about the defect in his DePuy metal hip parts. It was then that he received notice that DePuy had recalled some of the hip implant components used in his hip replacement surgery, allegedly due to the defect that Danny describes here.

Danny argues that the recall constitutes an admission of liability by DePuy. He is raising claims based on theories of defective design, defective manufacture or construction, failure to warn, nonconformance to manufacturer’s representation, and supplier liability, all of which fall under Ohio state consumer protection laws.

The DePuy Multidistrict Litigation

Danny’s claim will join many other similar claims as part of the DePuy hip implant multidistrict litigation, or MDL, that is now proceeding in a federal court in Ohio.

This MDL was set up by the federal Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation back in 2010 in order to handle what was expected to be a large number of individual hip implant lawsuits naming DePuy as a defendant.

Since these claims share common factual and legal issues, the Panel has assigned them to a single court so that U.S. District Judge David A. Katz can oversee coordinated pretrial procedures. Conducting those procedures together can promote more efficient processing and more consistent pretrial decisions.

Danny’s DePuy Metal Hip Lawsuit is Case No. 1:17-dp-200099-JJH, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio.