A Philadelphia jury has awarded a woman $80 million for injuries caused by pelvic mesh manufactured by Johnson & Johnson’s Ethicon subsidiary, according to media reports.
The award includes $50 million in punitive damages and $30 million in compensatory damages — the largest compensatory damages verdict to date in a pelvic mesh case, a company spokeswoman told Bloomberg News.
Patricia Mesigian, 75, of Media, Pa., had Ethicon’s ProLift mesh implanted in 2008 to treat pelvic organ prolapse. The mesh caused her pain, inflammation, infection and scar tissue, and surgeons could not fully remove it despite repeated procedures.
The jury deliberated two days before rendering its verdict.
“In this largest transvaginal compensatory jury verdict to date, this jury resoundingly found that Johnson & Johnson terribly injured another one of thousands of women implanted with its defective transvaginal mesh device, recognizing not only the severity of the injury but the abhorrence of the conduct,” Mesigian’s trial attorney, Thomas Kline, said in an emailed statement Saturday to the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Last week’s verdict resulted in the second major compensatory damages award rendered by a Philadelphia jury against Ethicon in a month. In April, a jury awarded an Altoona, Pa., woman $120 million, including $100 million in punitive damages, in a pelvic mesh case.
The company has said it plans to appeal both verdicts.