C.R. Bard faces hundreds of lawsuits regarding its Inferior Vena Cava Filters (IVC filters), the first of which is scheduled to go to trial next fall. However, while the company prepares for the trial, plaintiffs around the country are filing an increasing number of Bard IVC filter lawsuits.

One such lawsuit was recently filed by a Nevada woman who had one of Bard’s Meridian IVC filters implanted in 2014. Like many other patients with IVC filters implanted, the Nevada woman experienced adverse side effects.

Bard has had a tough time with IVC filters for over ten years. The FDA approved the company’s first IVC filter, the Recovery filter, in 2002. However, by 2004 the company received reports its devices failed inside patients. The IVC filters fractured, causing pieces to travel throughout the body or the device migrated from its original position in the inferior vena cava.

By 2005, the number of reports of defective Recovery filters was so high the company voluntarily removed them from the market. Since the recall, Bard has manufactured a number of IVC filters, including the G2, G2X, Eclipse, and Meridian filters.

Unfortunately, Bard’s later models proved just as vulnerable to failure as the Recovery filter. In 2010 and again in 2015, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration released safety warnings to patients and doctors advising that IVC filters should not be left in the body for long periods of time as the risk of failure increases with time.

Bard currently faces over 1,000 IVC filter lawsuits centralized in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona under Judge David G. Campbell. Judge Campbell ordered the first bellwether cases to be selected by May 2017, so the first case can go to trial before 2017 is out.