A recent wrongful death lawsuit alleges that the testosterone replacement therapy drug AndroGel is a hazardous product that cost a Los Angeles man his life.

Plaintiff Cassius W. has filed a testosterone product lawsuit against AbbVie, claiming the pharmaceutical manufacturer’s low-t drug, AndroGel, caused his son to suffer a fatal heart attack on June 2, 2013.

This low-t drug lawsuit joins other similar cases consolidated into a multidistrict litigation. All of the cases allege that AbbVie and other testosterone product manufacturers falsely marketed testosterone replacement therapy as a safe and effective treatment for hypogonadism, or “low testosterone,” when the drugs allegedly cause serious medical problems including life threatening cardiac events, strokes, and thrombolytic events.

Concerns Surrounding Low-T Therapy

The FDA has been investigating the safety of low testosterone therapy for years. The agency issued an alert on Jan. 31, 2014, detailing two studies which suggested the low-t treatments might increase the risk for heart attack, stroke, and death in certain men.

On March 3, 2015, the agency updated the alert and announced that new information would be added to the drugs’ labels regarding the potential association with heart attacks and strokes. In addition, testosterone products labels would be modified to clarify current approved uses, as testosterone replacement is only indicated to treat men who suffer from hypogonadism due to disorders of the testicles, pituitary gland, or brain.

The FDA said it had become aware that prescription testosterone treatments were being used extensively to relieve symptoms in men who have low testosterone for no apparent reason other than aging.

Testosterone Products Litigation

Low-t therapy drugs have been extremely profitable for AbbVie and other testosterone product manufacturers. However, men taking testosterone therapy have often faced side effects, including: heart attack, stroke, pulmonary embolism, and deep vein thrombosis. Many of these men who have allegedly suffered serious cardiovascular events due to their use of prescription testosterone treatments have sued the pharmaceutical manufacturers seeking compensation for their injuries.

The heart of these testosterone product lawsuits is that men and doctors were not adequately warned about the side effects and that the drugs’ manufacturers wrongly marketed their testosterone products as safe and effective treatments for lowered sex drive, fatigue and other age-related symptoms, even though they were never approved for this use.

Over 1,500 testosterone product lawsuits have been filed in the Northern District of Illinois, where a low-t drug MDL (multidistrict litigation) was established in June 2014 to efficiently process the multitude of similar testosterone product allegations.

The Testosterone Product MDL is In re: Testosterone Replacement Therapy Product Liability Litigation, MDL No. 254, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.