Blog Written by Attorney Jean S. Martin

This year’s recall list for manufacturer Johnson & Johnson just continues to grow.  DePuy Orthopaedics, a division of the corporate conglomerate Johnson & Johnson, has issued a voluntary recall of its ASR XL Acetabular System, a total hip replacement system, and DePuy ASR Hip Resurfacing System, a partial hip replacement system.  The international recall notice states that these hip replacement products will wear out in five years or less, requiring patients to endure another hip replacement surgery.  Patients with these hip implant devices have reported pain and swelling in the hip.  X-rays and MRI scans have shown that the product has slipped out of the bone socket and, in some cases, had chipped or broken.  Patients reporting the most problems are females and those with ASR heads measuring below 50mm in diameter.  Patients should be contacted to return to their doctors for a clinical examination, blood tests and an MRI to determine positioning and function of the joint replacement.

This latest recall joins an ever-growing list of bad publicity for Johnson & Johnson this year.  Johnson & Johnson’s consumer unit has been plagued by recalls of Tylenol, Motrin and other over the counter medications this year.  A week before this latest announcement, Johnson & Johnson’s Vision Care recalled over 100,000 boxes of Acuvue TruEye contact lenses in Asia and Europe.  While the previous recalls seem to have been related to manufacturing issues, the recall of these hip replacement products seem to be a defect in design. Since December, the company had been phasing out this product, but not before more than 90,000 of them have been implanted in patient worldwide.