A new hernia surgery mesh lawsuit has been filed in a federal court in Georgia. The plaintiff, Christa J., has named Ethicon Inc. and Johnson and Johnson Inc. as defendants in her complaint.

Christa is a citizen and resident of the State of Pennsylvania and was implanted with the hernia surgery mesh in question in Pennsylvania. She was implanted with the Physiomesh hernia surgery mesh on Sept. 10, 2013 at University of Pennsylvania Medical Center in Pittsburgh, Pa.

While no specific information is available regarding the failure of the hernia surgery mesh implanted in her short-form complaint, she accuses the defendants of the following counts from the long-form complaint:

Count One—Strict Product Liability, Defective Design; Count Two—Strict Product Liability, Failure to Warn; Count Three—Strict Product Liability, Manufacturing Defect; Count Four—Negligence; and Count Five—Violation of Pennsylvania Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law 73 P.S. § 201 et seq.

She also accuses Ethicon Inc. and Johnson and Johnson Inc. of additional counts in her hernia surgery mesh lawsuit as follows:

Count Six—Gross Negligence; Count Eight—Punitive Damages; Count Nine—Discovery Rule, Equitable Tolling, and Estoppel.

Christa is asking for a trial by jury with compensatory damages according to evidence provided in said trial. She hopes for consideration of her personal pain and suffering, both physical and mental, her loss of wages and earning power, and cost of litigation in terms of court and attorney fees.

Ethicon Physiomesh—A History of Problems

Christa’s hernia mesh lawsuit joins Multidistrict Litigation (MDL) No. 2782, Ethicon Physiomesh Flexible Composite Hernia Mesh Products Liability Litigation. According to the long-form complaint from this MDL, Ethicon’s Physiomesh hernia surgery mesh is composed of five layers. There are two layers of monocryl film sandwiching two other layers of polydioxanone film. The latter covers one layer of polypropylene mesh.

The manufacturing defendants allegedly promoted this mesh, made differently than any other on the market, as ideally suited to discourage swelling, adhesions, and encourage the body to incorporate it as actual functional tissue.

The complaint alleges this scenario did not play out in reality. The manufacturers should have known the risks prior to marketing the hernia surgery mesh product known as Physiomesh.

According to the plaintiffs in the Physiomesh MDL, the multiple layers of the product have been known to produce or contribute to complications such as foreign body rejection, infection and swelling as well as a delay in healing.

Plaintiffs claims the coating allows for bacteria to grow and reproduce to such a degree that the immune system cannot eliminate the offense. Additionally, they also claim the coating does not allow intracellular fluid to flush out of the area which would help remove growing bacteria ideally.

This Hernia Surgery Mesh Lawsuit is Case No. 1:17-cv-05372-RWS in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Atlanta Division.