After 6 Years, Depuy Asr Metal Hip Implants Bound To Fail Says British Study

Trouble in Britain for Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and its subsidiary DePuy Orthopaedics Inc

. after a British database released information that its metal-on-metal hip implants fail within a span of six years. Some 29 percent of patients who used the DePuy ASR hip replacement systems have reported that their implants have failed after only six years of usage, based on the data gathered by the National Joint Registry for England and Wales. A report in the New York Times said that metal-on-metal implants can cause tissue and muscle damage.

After the DePuy announced a worldwide recall of two of its hip replacement systems, the ASR XL Acetabular System and the DePuy ASR Hip Resurfacing Platform, last August 2010, the National Joint Registry for England and Wales started tracking hip replacement problems in Britain. The recall followed the release of medical studies which found that the metal-on-metal hip implants had a high failure rate in stark contrast to its 15-year life expectancy. However, more than 90,000 DePuy ASR XL Acetabular Systems and DePuy ASR Hip Resurfacing Systems have already been sold worldwide before the recall and about 40,000 of those were sold in the United States.

Manufacturers are of the opinion that the rate could not be as high as the British registrys calculation for the six-year hip implant failure. The registrys five year failure rate numbers are even higher than the manufacturers estimates with 17 percent of British ASR hip recipients reporting failures. The Registry data further suggests that with all hip implants that feature metal-on-metal designs appearing to have a higher failure rate than other types of artificial hips, the problems on metal-on-metal hip replacements are not limited to the recalled DePuy ASR implants.

In comparison, however, other types of hip implants including combinations of ceramic, plastic and metal only have a 4.7 percent failure rate after seven years than the metal-on-metal hip implants which have a failure rate of 14 percent, according to the registry data. Part of the concern for this high failure rate is a defective hip implants potential to cause metal toxicity among its recipients. The cup in the recalled ASR device is so shallow that it is susceptible to so called edge loading, a situation wherein the joints ball strikes against the cups edge and causes the implant parts to rub together and chisel off debris that releases microscopic ions of the heavy metals chromium and cobalt into the body, according to Parker McDonald P.C., a Texas law firm, which represents plaintiffs seeking remedies for medical issues arising from the failure of metal-on-metal hip implant devices.

There may be a need to undergo a risky hip revision surgery as metal debris inside the body could result in soft tissue damage, inflammatory reactions, bone loss, genetic damage, asceptic fibrosis, local necrosis or other problems. In the US alone, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has received about 5,000 complaints on metal-on-metal hip replacement and nearly 4,000 of these complaints involved DePuy. This means that despite the DePuy hip replacement recall, more lawsuits are expected to be filed against J&J which has bulked up its liability fund by $570 million to cover the cost of DePuy ASR settlements. J&J has bulked up its liability fund by $570 million to cover the cost of DePuy ASR settlement as more lawsuits are expected to be filed against J&J despite the hip replacement recall. More lawsuits are expected to be filed against J&J which has bulked up its liability fund by $570 million to cover the cost of DePuy ASR settlements despite the ASR hipreplacement recall.

by: Katherine Russel

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