Posted by Doug King on 8/29/13

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Hello, my name is Doug King and I am writing on behalf of
my daughter, Erica King. We live in Locust Grove, OK and
she has a pending shoulder pain pump case in Tulsa, OK
against Woo Young Medical in South Korea.

The Sill Law Group (our law firm) in Edmond, OK has decided
to drop our case. They are a very small firm and I think
that they never had intentions of going to trial. I think
that they thought they could find something and get a quick
and easy settlement without investing anything. I am not
sure how hard our attorney actually worked on our case. It
has been over three years since we started this case. Last
month was the first time that he ever met us and it was the
day he told us they were dropping our case. We never did
any interviews, depositions, etc. When I would email him,
it would always take two or three times to get a one line
response from him. Even when speaking to him yesterday, he
used the wrong defendant’s name, etc.

Erica King had her first shoulder surgery in October 2006.
She was 15 years old at this time. She is now 21 years
old. Her surgeon, Dr. Grooms placed a pain pump in the
interior space of the shoulder joint and now most of her
cartilage is dead. She has had three surgeries so far with
a resurfacing the last time. She is in need of a shoulder
joint replacement, but her surgeon wants her to wait as
long as possible since she is so young. He is not sure if
she will need 2 or 3 replacements in her lifetime, or if
that many are possible. He claims that it could lead to
possible amputation.

Here are some facts about the case:

We have a report on causation from Dr. Costouros of
Stanford School Of Medicine. I will attach it for
reference.

Her surgeon, Dr. Grooms in Muskogee, OK used an accufuser
pain pump “off-label” in her shoulder.
He admits no reps ever came to him and stated their use in
the joint was alright. He used it because colleagues and
peers were using them. How can a surgeon or doctor use an
item for a purpose for which it wasn’t intended, nor FDA
approved and not be liable?

We sued Moog originally. They owned the accufuser brand in
the fall of 2006, but they denied ownership. They bought
the brand in summer 2006 and the pump used in Erica’s
shoulder was already on the shelf (they claimed). I will
attach a copy of the accufuser label.

We then sued Woo Young Medical, the actual manufacturer of
the pain pump before the Moog purchase. They are in South
Korea. There is an ongoing case in North Carolina against
Woo Young Medical that is very similar to ours. I will
attach it also.

In doing some research, I think that Woo Young Medical and
Moog still both market the same accufuser T2060L pain pump.

The Block case in North Carolina states Woo Young Medical
is a Hong Kong company. I don’t know how this helps them,
but they are in South Korea. Our attorney also stated that
he worried that if we got a judgment, they wouldn’t pay it
since they were in South Korea. He thought they would have
to go to court In South Korea to recover the judgment. He
thought that the Hague convention would not help.

Our attorney said our only avenue is a “duty to test” and
he thinks in Oklahoma, that it will get nowhere.
Our attorney claims that Woo Young Medical never went to
the FDA like the other pain pump manufacturers. He doesn’t
feel that he can prove that they had a “failure to warn”
complaint against them. The case in North Carolina
suggests that they knew what was going on in the industry
and therefore should have tested for that purpose. They
also state that Woo Young marketed the pain pump as a “pain
kit for orthopedic surgery” with an exclusive distributor
agreement with McKinley Infuser, LLC. It states there is
evidence that Woo Young Medical promoted this use and
expressly consented to the Accufuser’s orthopedic, off-
label use.

Our attorney claims that the surgeon isn’t liable because
he was doing what everyone else was doing and they didn’t
know this was causing harm. They didn’t know that it
wouldn’t cause harm either. I think that there should be
some liability there. Everyone else is doing it is not a
viable excuse to me. I think that the surgeon’s hospital
may also show a lack of control. If you have doctors and
surgeons using items “off-label” and those things are
harmful to patients, your institution is out of control in
my opinion.

Our attorney claims that if this was a “stryker”, “I-flow”
or one of the other domestic companies, it would be an open
and shut case. I don’t understand as it is the same
condition, same type pump and same end result of
Chondrolysis.

I still feel Erica has a very strong case and someone is
liable for her injury. She suffers from constant pain.
She switched her career path from physical therapy to
business management because she can’t physically be a
physical therapist that she wanted to be. She has very
limited range of motion without pain. She has trouble
taking care of her son, managing her household and limits
her activities around her shoulder.

Please let me know if this case might interest you. If you
would like more information, feel free to call or email.
Our attorney claims that he is willing to be helpful and
will be glad to talk to someone. I just think they are not
willing to put forth the effort.

Thanks,
Doug King
Locust Grove, OK
918-695-0286

Here is an email that the Sill Law Group sent to the
referring attorney (Jeff Martin) with a summary of the
case. I don’t know if this helps you or not…

The list of negatives from the Sills
Jeff:
1) Woo Young is a South Korean Company that
does not maintain
assets in the U.S. so it will be extremely costly and
difficult to collect a judgment;
2) Dr. Grooms, the surgeon, had no contact with
any promotion by Woo Young. He states he learned from
colleagues and will have no defendant-specific testimony of
sales rep contact and probably state he made no reliance
on labeling;
3) There’s no evidence that Woo Young did
anything except sign
a distribution contract with a third party. They did not
request permission from the FDA to use the pump in the
joint space the way Stryker did. Our theory will be based
on omission or on an agency theory for everything the other
party to the distribution contract actually did, which is
weak.
4) Causation and surviving Daubert will be
difficult and
expensive. Their MSJ will be tough to overcome and will
require to spend a lot on at least three experts.
5) There are only 5 other Woo Young cases in
the U.S. that I
have been able to find, and we have 1 of those. With no
MDL we will be trying a one off case to verdict with a
very real possibility that we will not be able to collect.
6) We will be looking at a cost investment of
well into six
figures to trial and a realistic verdict of $600 to $700K
with the very real possibility of spending an additional
50k on appeal and collection efforts that might not be
successful.

pain pump case, 8/29/13, by Doug King.

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