Innocent Patients Shouldering the Burden of Misguided Pain Pump Use

Chandler, AZA medical device that was supposed to alleviate pain has been shown to aggravate and even cause grievous shoulder injury, according to various reports as well as those who have suffered from the fallout of shoulder pain pump use. Shoulder repair surgery is painful. And yet shoulder injury stemming from the incorrect use of such pain pumps can inflict pain in various forms, including the pocketbook.

That's because the breakdown of cartilage in the shoulder—a result of shoulder pain pump use—often requires additional invasive surgery and, in some cases a total shoulder replacement that can cost much more than most can afford to pay.

Lawsuits have sprung up due to the allegation that various shoulder pain pump manufacturers lobbied the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to approve the use of pain pump insertion into the shoulder. When the FDA refused, manufacturers allegedly went ahead and promoted the use of the shoulder pain pump directly to the shoulder joint to doctors, without the FDA's blessing.

The shoulder pain pump is approved for use in soft tissue surrounding the shoulder joint, but not directly to the shoulder, out of concern for the welfare of shoulder joint cartilage. Certain combinations of pain medication have proven toxic to cartilage. Once the cartilage breaks down, a painful condition known as Chondrolysis develops with often devastating consequences.

Critics Say Shoulder Pain Pump Manufactures Must Shoulder Their Part of the Blame

Examples of some of the lawsuits that have ensued include a complaint filed by Laura E. Ashworth, of Maricopa County, Arizona. Following arthroscopic surgery on her right shoulder in March, 2006 at the Arizona Orthopedic Surgical Hospital in Chandler, Arizona, Ms. Ashworth's surgeon inserted a pain pump in the space above the shoulder joint, but not directly into the intra-articular joint space. Less than three months later, on June 12th, she re-injured her right shoulder and underwent a second arthroscopic surgery at the same facility. This time the orthopedic surgeon implanted the catheter of a shoulder pain pump directly into the intra-articular space of her right shoulder.

As a result Ms. Ashcroft suffered narrowing of the joint space and/or chondrolysis, a condition, which results in the complete, or near-complete loss of cartilage in the shoulder joint. Chondrolysis is irreversible, save for replacing the entire shoulder. Her lawsuit alleges that defendant I-Flow did not warn the plaintiff or her surgeon, who used the devices as instructed and directed by the defendant, about the unreasonable risks and dangers of using the pain pump and anesthetic medications in such fashio