Excalibur Recalls Crossbows Due to Injury Hazard; Can Fire Unexpectedly

Consumers should stop using this product unless otherwise instructed. It is illegal to resell or attempt to resell a recalled consumer product.
Recall date: APRIL 22, 2014 Recall number: 14-154

Recall Summary

Name of product:
Excalibur Matrix Mega 405 Crossbows

Hazard:
The crossbow can fire an arrow without the trigger being pulled, posing an injury hazard to the user and to bystanders.

Remedy:
Repair

Consumer Contact:
Excalibur Crossbow at (800) 463-1817 from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday or online at www.excaliburcrossbow.com and click on “Important Safety Notice for Matrix 405 Owners” for more information.

From the CPSC

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$63,974 Verdict: Parties disputed whether auto accident caused injuries

Plaintiff sought wage loss, medical bills

On Feb. 20, 2011, plaintiff was involved in an auto accident, which resulted in a back injury requiring surgery. Plaintiff, a young single mother, did not have pre-existing back issues and sought third-party overdue benefits damages from defendant State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co.

Defendant argued that plaintiff’s treatment for the back injury was not related to the auto accident.

Plaintiff’s counsel narrowed the issues to be decided by the jury to wage loss, medical bills and interest.

A Macomb County jury determined that plaintiff was injured in the accident and awarded $14,467.44 in allowable expenses; $36,532.32 in wage loss; and $12,974.33 in interest for overdue benefits.

Plaintiff brought a motion for attorney’s fees and costs. The matter then settled for $120,000.

Type of action: Third-party no-fault

Type of injuries: Back injury requiring surgery

Court/Case no./Date: Macomb County Circuit Court; 2011-5099-NI; Sept. 18, 2013

Tried before: Jury

Verdict amount: $63,974

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A birth injury fund would offer care equality for child malpractice victims, Mercy Medical Center official says

Sarah Gantz, Reporter- Baltimore Business Journal

When babies are born with disabilities at Mercy Medical Center in Baltimore, Dr. Susan Dulkerian is the one who takes care of them.

Dulkerian, who is medical director of the hospital’s newborn services, knows first hand who suffers most when something goes wrong during birth.

Some of the children get help if their parents sue a hospital or doctor and are successful. But many more are stuck with the hand they’ve been dealt.

Dulkerian is among the advocates for a  birth injury fund, which is gaining support in Maryland. Such a fund would help more children injured during birth get the financial support they deserve, Dulkerian said.

“The reality of malpractice is not everyone sues. There are people who have affected children who just don’t get anything,” Dulkerian said. “There is an inequality.”
A birth injury fund is a pool of money that doctors and hospitals pay into to support families whose children were injured during birth. Families are guaranteed an award from the fund and, in exchange, give up their right to sue.

The state health department will be looking into establishing a birth injury fund in Maryland, where doctors and hospitals say rising malpractice insurance costs are making it difficult to keep obstetrics practices and maternity wards in business.
Opponents say that birth injury funds are unfair to families because they do not hold doctors accountable for mistakes the way lawsuits do.

Dulkerian sees things differently.

She says lengthy lawsuits — and the fact that you need a lawsuit at all — to get help paying for birth-related disabilities are unfair to those children.

Often parents decide not to sue, Dulkerian said. Some do not have the time and money to spend years in court while others simply don’t want to file a lawsuit. Those families still deserve help, she said.

Children suffer even when the family does sue, Dulkerian said. As litigation drags on for years, the child may be missing out on needed health care services.

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17 workers at HighPointe nursing home accused of felony patient abuse

By Lou Michel News Staff Reporter on buffnews.com

Seventeen workers at the HighPointe nursing facility are accused by the State Attorney General’s Office of abusing patients at the facility on Michigan Avenue, a law enforcement source told The Buffalo News.

Felony criminal complaints filed in Buffalo City Court allege mistreatment of residents at the facility, but the files will not be made public until the accused are arraigned Friday afternoon, court representatives said.

More details are expected to be released later today.

The Buffalo nursing home is operated by Kaleida Health.

An official at HighPointe declined to comment on the law enforcement action and officials at Kaleida Health did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

HighPointe on Michigan Health Care Facility is a 300-bed facility that opened in December 2011 on the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus. The $64 million facility replaced the 242-bed Deaconess Center on Humboldt Parkway and the 75-bed skilled-nursing unit in Millard Fillmore Hospital, Gates Circle.

HighPointe was the first nursing home built in Buffalo in decades.

The facility posted a 97 percent occupancy rate last month.

Some 270 beds are devoted for residential health care with the rest for pediatric and ventilator patients, according to state Health Department records.

The state received 119 complaints and incident reports through February 2014. The facility’s 44.8 complaints per 100 occupied beds exceeded the state average of 34.1, according to state Health Department data.

The state Health Department conducted 59 on-site inspections at HighPointe. The facility’s 6.4 deficiency citations per 100 occupied beds exceeded the statewide average of 2.2, according to the Health Department data.

Eleven of the 17 citations dealt with quality of care.

Inspectors did not observe actual harm during any visits since 2013 but found many of the problems had the potential for more than minimal harm. Slightly more than half of the problems noted by inspectors were deemed isolated, with the rest part of a pattern. But none of the problems were widespread, according to the state data.

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Troy-Bilt Electric Leaf Blowers Recalled by MTD Due to Laceration Hazard

Consumers should stop using this product unless otherwise instructed. It is illegal to resell or attempt to resell a recalled consumer product.
Recall date: APRIL 22, 2014 Recall number: 14-151

Name of product:
Troy-Bilt electric leaf blowers

Hazard:
The blower’s impeller can break and strike the operator during use, posing a laceration hazard.

Remedy:
Replace

Consumer Contact:
Troy-Bilt toll-free at (888) 848-6038 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday or online at www.troybilt.com and click on Recalls under the Owner’s Center tab for more information.

From the CPSC

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US study warns that drunk driving endangers children

by Aurel Niculescu www.inautonews.com - Tuesday, May 6th, 2014

According to a study made by Northwestern University, two thirds of children killed in drunk driving accidents were actually in the car with the intoxicated person.

The study, headed by Dr. Kyran Quinlan, of Northwestern University and conducted with the help of researchers from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, finds out that basic statistics are the same from three decades ago – although the total number of deaths related to drunk driving has declined in recent years.
“Despite what’s commonly thought, it’s not a family in one car and a drunk driver in another,” said Dr. Quinlan. Also, “about 70 % of the time the drunk driver survived the crash.”
Ironically and unfortunately, with the statistics revealing that many times the crashes were survivable, the study also reveals that almost two out of three of the children killed didn’t have their seat belts on.
For children under the age of 15%, car crashes are among the leading causes of death – in 2010 alone 1,210 fatalities occurred and, according to government tracking data one in five was due to drunk driving. The researchers used the federal FARS – Fatality Analysis Reporting System – to search for crashes in between 2001 and 2010 – with 2,344 such fatalities, in which 65% of the children were in the car with the intoxicated person.

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Harvard doctor blasts surgical procedure at UPMC, Allegheny Health Network

Apr 29, 2014, Kris B. Mamula Reporter- Pittsburgh Business Times

A Harvard University affiliated surgeon sharply criticized a common gynecological surgery done at UPMC and Allegheny Health Network hospitals, calling it a “shameful act of professional negligence.”

Dr. Hooman Noorchashm, a cardiovascular surgeon and lecturer at Harvard Medical School, said that mincing uterine tissue with tiny blades for extraction in a process called power morcellation is “no longer a standard of care in the United States” because of its potential to spread cancer. Allegheny General Hospital’s academic partner, Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia, is among the medical centers that have suspended or restricted use of the procedure.

Noorchashm has mounted a campaign to end use of the procedure after his wife, anesthesiologist Dr. Amy Reed, developed advanced cancer following routine power morcellation for hysterectomy. His campaign resulted in an April 17 warning from the Food and Drug Administration about use of the procedure because of its potential to spread undetected cancer.

In a prepared statement, Dr. W. Allen Hogge, chair of the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh, said  UPMC doctors advise patients of the procedure’s surgical risk, then make sure they “understand and accepts those risks.” But Noorchashm, 41, called UPMC’s informed consent practice “ethically flawed.”

“It does nothing to protect the patient, but protects the hospital from liability,” he said. “That’s not medicine, it’s business.

“The scope of this error is pretty enormous.”

There are some 600,000 hysterectomies performed annually, making it among the most common surgical procedures. The rate of power morcellation is about 10 percent.

Power morcellation exposes women to a 1-in-350 risk of dying from cancer, Noorchashm said. Screening for cancer before the minimally invasive procedure is not always effective.

AHN spokesman Dan Laurent said Tuesday afternoon that the system was planning a "comprehensive review of the procedure." In the meantime, every patient would be evaluated individually for the risks and benefits of power morcellation.

But, AHN gynecologic oncologist Thomas Krivak defended use of the device, saying to stop using the procedure was a “mistake.” The procedure should be done in younger patients where the cancer risk is very low, he said.

“The big question is does it make the cancer worse,” he said. “Intuitively the answer is yes, but it really hasn’t been proven.”

Krivak said he was speaking for himself and not for AHN, but said the procedure could be beneficial.
“It just has to be used in a judicious manner, in appropriate patients,” he said.

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