We have a large team of plaintiffs attorneys handling the SSRI birth defect litigation. Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman and Robinson, Calcagnie & Robinson have created a joint venture in order to prosecute the firms' SSRI antidepressant birth defect cases. The team of plaintiffs' attorneys working together on these cases includes Michael Baum, Kate Gillespie, Nicole Maldonado and George W. Murgatroyd III, from Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman based in Los Angeles, and Mark P. Robinson, Jr., Karen Barth Menzies and Jennifer Liakos from Robinson, Calcagnie & Robinson based in Newport Beach, California. Both firms have many years of experience handling pharmaceutical product liability, mass tort litigation and consumer class actions against major drug companies. Anyone in need of an antidepressant birth defect lawyer should contact us for a free consultation.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a Public Health Advisory for Paxil on December 8, 2005 based on U.S. and Swedish studies showing that exposure to Paxil in the first trimester of pregnancy may be associated with an increased risk of heart birth defects. Most of the cardiac defects observed in these studies were atrial or ventricular septal defects, conditions in which the wall between the right and left sides of the heart is not completely developed.
Because SSRIs have a similar side effect profile generally, we are investigating whether or not other antidepressants such as Celexa, Effexor, Lexapro, Prozac, Symbyax and Zoloft cause the same birth defects as Paxil. We represent many families whose children have heart birth defects where their mother's were on one of these antidepressants during pregnancy. Our firm filed one of the first lawsuits against GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) alleging that its drug, Paxil, caused the heart defects in a young child from Texas. We have since filed many lawsuits against GSK and are preparing more.
The latest FDA warning required GlaxoSmithKline, Paxil’s manufacturer, to relabel it’s product with a new warning reflecting the change in the FDA’s outlook regarding Paxil, which includes a change from a Category C use to Category D use for pregnant women. Specifically, in the release dated Dec. 8, 2005, the FDA says “Category D means that studies in pregnant women (controlled or observational) have demonstrated a risk to the fetus. ”
Paxil crosses the placenta during pregnancy and reaches the fetus. As early as 1997, there were reports of babies born with neonatal withdrawal syndrome after their mothers took Paxil during the third trimester of pregnancy. These “Paxil Babies” presented with symptoms that one might expect of a baby exposed to an opiate (heroin, methadone, or morphine) such as irritability, constant crying, shivering, increased tonus, eating and sleeping difficulties and convulsions. Paxil was present in all of these infants’ blood tests. In one study, a baby, although well enough to be discharged from the hospital, was still shivering at four weeks of age.
The findings in this study were consistent with an earlier study done regarding in utero exposure to Prozac. In that case, 31.5% of the infants who had been exposed to Prozac during the pregnancy had neonatal withdrawal syndrome—which shows that withdrawal symptoms in infants exposed to SSRIs are not rare.
To join in lawsuits being filed concerning SSRI related heart defects contact a Baum Hedlund attorney at 800-827-0087 or fill out our case form as soon as possible.