Product Injury

As incredible as it sounds, a central Florida student from East Ridge Middle School in Lake County died after choking on a hot dog at school on Friday, June 4. EMS workers arrived in the cafeteria and were able to establish some airway, but he later died at the hospital. We wonder if there was anyone certified in CPR or the Heimlich maneuver at the school to help the poor student. Our deepest sympathy goes out to his grieving family.

This is not dissimilar to another situation involving 23-month old Allison Hale. She was eating from a microwave bag of popcorn when a kernel became lodged in her throat and she stopped breathing. Then her heart stopped beating. The autopsy showed she inhaled popcorn into a lung, her bronchial tubes, and her vocal cords.

Now the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is calling on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to require a warning label on food that can present a choking hazard – not unlike what is already required for toys that are dangerous.

The hot dog is a leading hazard, as are grapes and candy, and the AAP would like manufacturers to redesign the food. The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council tells the New York Times that the redesign is not going to happen. Already there is a hot dog on the market that breaks apart when eaten.

Children under the age of 4 are most susceptible to the dangers of choking on dangerous foods. It’s best to wait until they are five or older to introduce the foods. Estimates are that about 160 children died from food obstructions in 2000. Most parents say the same thing, “I can’t believe this happened, I was standing right there.”

The Heimlich maneuver can be performed on a child older than one year, but if the child is younger, face them down on your knee and slap the area between the shoulder blades five times. Be sure you’ve already called 911.

New research is warning that children are increasingly swallowing button and cylindrical batteries that can lodge in the throat and cause serious injury. The button batteries are used for watches, remote controls, flashlights, hearing aids and cameras. The research, published in the June issue of Pediatrics, comes from two institutions – the National Capital Poison Center and department of emergency medicine at Georgetown University School of Medicine in Washington, D.C.

One study looked at the problem of battery ingestion found to have increased 6.7-fold between 1985 and 2009. That is a direct result of the increase in the use of the small batteries. Researchers are calling for child-resistant measures including a warning label and a seal to better keep the batteries out of little hands. Lodged in the esophagus, they must be removed within two hours before serious injuries can occur such as tearing tissue, burning and internal bleeding.

Jacksonville product liability injury attorneys are concerned that battery ingestions of both the 20-25 millimeter diameter batteries and the lithium battery cells are on the rise. The lithium batteries pose the most risk because they can cause severe burns two hours after ingesting. The research shows that children under the age of 6 were most likely to be involved in button battery ingestions, in 62.5% of the time.

In the case of fatalities and major injuries, 85% of the time it occurred in children under the age of four. Too often the medical community does not know what to look for and more than half of the fatal cases, 13 of the17 cases, the symptoms were initially misdiagnosed. Researchers say the medical community needs to be better trained in what symptoms to look for including lethargy, poor appetite, vomiting, irritability, cough, wheezing and dehydration.

Drew James consumed a lot of caffeine. Whether energy drinks, soda or sweet tea, the 19-year-old from Nassau County loved caffeine. In January after going to the movies with a friend, he collapsed at a friend’s home in Bryceville. According to www.jacksonville.com, he had consumed an energy drink on his way home. After drinking half of a can of Monster Nitrous, he fell backwards and began seizing. He never woke up. The medical examiner suspected drugs, and he found it of sorts. James had a heart thicker than the normal heart, according to the report. The leading theory behind his death is that the caffeine triggered his heart to beat irregularly. He had caffeine, nicotine and traces of marijuana in his urine. With the exception of the marijuana, they are all legal drugs.

Our hearts go out to the family members of James who lost this teen so young in life from a hazard that no one understood.

Liability Considerations
James’ mother, Cheryl, wants to require energy drink makers to list on the can the amount of caffeine in their products and to provide specific health warnings. Monster Nitrous advises people to “consume responsibly” by limiting themselves to three cans a day. The amount of caffeine is not listed. Mayo Clinic says that consuming two to four cups of coffee a day, or about 200 to 300 milligrams of caffeine, is not harmful. Double that can cause a fast or irregular heartbeat, headache and anxiety. A friend of the family writes to the news that the drugs were found in his urine, not his blood and had he been a regular consumer of marijuana it would have been in his blood. He had reportedly been drinking Red Bull on a regular basis, and this family friend writes that the medical examiner told Drew’s mother there were no underlying heart issues. The news doesn’t always get it right.

Hopefully it won’t take losing another child for consumers to understand that there is a danger with highly caffeinated drinks. Many people occasionally suffer from irregular heartbeats that are undiagnosed. Caffeine can interrupt the regular heart rhythm, yet the product is sold right next to juices and water, has no FDA review, and the manufacturer has a responsibility to not just make money, but to better warn the public. In 2008, a group of scientists also called on the FDA to better regulate energy drinks because of the potential dangers. A Florida personal injury attorney and investigator can protect your rights when a dangerous and defective product is on store shelves. Cheryl James just wants the age limited raised to 21 for the drug, caffeine, just like the drug, alcohol is restricted to someone who is older. It sounds reasonable.

7-year-old Kristen Spears was born with cerebral palsy. Her limbs would be contracted and spastic and Spears would receive large doses of Botox to relax her limbs. Spears died November 24, 2007, allegedly as a result of the Botox injections. Now a Texas jury says the drug maker adequately warned about Botox dangers, according to a Los Angeles Times article.

Allergan, maker of Botox, was accused of being liable in the death of Spears who died of respiratory failure and pneumonia. Lawyers for the family said that Allergan did not adequately warn doctors about using the higher doses sometimes used in pediatric cerebral palsy cases. This case was closely watched as it’s the first time the botulinum toxin-based drug is accused of contributed to a death. Botox is best known for smoothing out wrinkles, but doctors sometimes prescribe it “off label” to be used in children with limb spasticity.

The jury took two days to decide that although Botox did pose a risk of substantial danger that regular customers would not know about, Allergan did not breach its duty to warn of those dangers. They never got to decide whether Botox contributed to her death after finding the warnings were adequate. Essentially they decided that Kristin died from the progression of her disease.

This news is out of the American Journal of Medicine. The latest study reports that regular use of aspirin, acetaminophen (Tylenol) and other analgesics can ultimately lead to a hearing loss in men, especially under the age of 50. According to The Los Angeles Times, the use of acetaminophen more than twice weekly increases hearing loss while the use of related non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and ibuprofen (NSAISA) increased the risk of hearing loss by nearly two-thirds.

Taking aspirin regularly increased hearing loss by about one third. More than 36 million Americans have hearing loss and it’s the most common sensory disorder.

Since researchers only studied men, and Caucasian men at that, there is no information on whether these results could be extrapolated to other people. With the extensive use of iPods cell phones and loud movie theatres, it would be interesting to see a study on the decibel level of everyday life and how that might be impacting hearing loss among middle-aged Americans.