Who’s At Fault for a Defective Medical Product?

When you purchase a product, you expect it to work. Sometimes that doesn’t happen, and you have a product that actually causes you harm. When it’s a medical device or a drug, the consequences can be far greater than biting down on a screw or getting a small shock from a faulty plug. A defective medical product or drug that’s faulty can lay permanent waste to your body.

Whether it actively affects your life immediately or down the line, you should not be held responsible for it. Someone else’s negligence allowed for the defective product to get into your hands. You had every reason to believe that the product or drug would work the way you were told it would. Now that it hasn’t, you should not be the one who has to pay for it out of your pocket.

But, if you seek damages, do you know who to seek damages from? It’s not always clear who is responsible in every situation. A defective medical product or drug could have gone bad due to the manufacturer, seller, or original patent filer. It all depends, and we can break down what you should do in each situation.

When is the Manufacturer Responsible For Defective Medical Products?

When the flaw is in the manufacturing, you can hold the manufacturer responsible. In any case, there would need to be an investigation into what caused the defect in the medical product or drug that hurt you. Examples of manufacturing defections would be:

• Leaving structural flaws in the container.
• Incorrect assembly of the product/drug.
• The product was contaminated before being fully assembled.

These could lead to a number of injuries, and in this case, you would want to file a lawsuit against the manufacturer. You wouldn’t necessarily want to sue the storefront you bought it from or the medical company that designed the defective medical product. Unless they are the same company as the manufacturer, or it could be proved they knew of the defect before the sale, your case would have better chances and lower fees suing one company.

When is the Seller Responsible for Defective Medical Products?

When the product becomes defective while it is being stocked or stored on the store shelf, then the seller is responsible. For clarification, the seller would be whatever storefront you purchased or picked up the product from. Sellers can make a product defective by:

• Storing the product/drug with products that could damage it.
• Storing the product in unsatisfactory temperatures.
• Breaking the product by dropping, throwing, or otherwise handling it roughly without reporting the damage.
• Contaminating the outside of the container.

Similarly to when the manufacturer is at fault, you would want to file a lawsuit only against the seller. In this instance, you’re more likely to find that someone knew the product was defective and sold it anyway. With a manufacturer, they may have automated portions of their manufacturing process. This means a seller could more likely be proven to have had malicious or careless intent with the sale of the product.

When the Patent Filer is Responsible for Defective Medical Products?

The company that brought together the product’s parts or ingredients, created the hypothesis, tested the product, and decided based on the results that it could be given to the public is considered the creator and often, the patent filer. It’s not uncommon for this company to be one and the same with the manufacturer or to be a collection of companies. In the instances that a patent filer is fault would be when:

• The product/drug works incorrectly.
• The product/drug has unadvertised side effects.

In this case, this usually stems from the defective medical product or drug never working to begin with. You’ll likely find that you’re not the only one who suffered from this product. Examples of defective medical products from the original source can see the largest recalls.

Contact Kalinoski Law Offices for Your Injury

If you or a loved one have been the victim of a defective medical product or drug, don’t suffer in silence. Let the companies who caused your personal injury be held responsible for the damages you suffered, both long-term and short-term. Contact Kalinoski Law Offices today to consult over your defective medical product or drug claim.

Tags: defective drug, defective medical product, defective product

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