A Pennsylvania woman waited at least three years too long to add a second product to her lawsuit claiming she was injured by Boston Scientific’s pelvic mesh, a federal court ruled.
Susan Antonucci had received multiple pelvic mesh implants over her lifetime, including two from Boston Scientific, but her original complaint only mentioned one of them — the Pinnacle — and could not be amended just before her trial to include the other one — the Lynx — said U.S. District Judge Christy Criswell Wiegand.
Antonucci and her husband had joined a multidistrict litigation concerning pelvic mesh products in the Southern District of West Virginia in 2013, writing on her “short-form complaint” that she had received Boston Scientific’s Pinnacle Pelvic Floor Repair Kit product in October 2008.
She had gotten the Pinnacle to deal with problems that hadn’t been fixed by a Lynx Suprapubic Mid-Urethral Sling System she had received in 2006, and both implants were eventually removed in 2012 and 2014. But Antonucci had only checked the box on the MDL short-form complaint for the Pinnacle.
The MDL court had started discovery for her case in early 2018, and the Lynx had been discussed in some of the discovery for the Pinnacle mesh, but Boston Scientific was not specifically notified that Antonucci intended to pursue claims related to the Lynx until much later.
Since Boston Scientific wouldn’t have known Antonucci was suing over the Lynx until the last minute, it couldn’t properly prepare a defense related to that product and was harmed by Antonucci’s delay in asking to amend. Judge Wiegand mostly agreed, though she said she would allow one witness, Dr. Michael Bonidie, to testify about revising the Lynx sling during one of Antonucci’s surgeries.
Law360: https://www.law360.com/articles/1398385/pa-woman-too-late-to-add-2nd-product-to-pelvic-mesh-suit
