Lawsuit claims bowel cleanser damaged woman's kidneys

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Lawsuit claims bowel cleanser damaged woman's kidneys

Cynthia T. Pegram
cpegram@newsadvance.com
Friday, May 18, 2007

A Texas woman who says she suffered kidney damage after using a bowel-cleansing product manufactured by C.B. Fleet has filed a $10 million product liability suit in Lynchburg Circuit Court against the company.

Lora Joyce Goza says in the suit she developed kidney failure after using Fleet’s Phospho-Soda bowel prep before undergoing a screening for colon cancer at a Texas hospital.

C.B. Fleet has not yet submitted its response to the suit, which was filed Monday. Lynchburg attorney Bernard Baldwin III, the registered agent for C.B. Fleet, could not be reached for comment Thursday.

According to the suit, Goza had no signs of kidney disease before using the product in May 2005, although she was taking six prescription drugs, including blood-pressure medications.

Interaction between the blood pressure treatment and the Fleet product caused the damage, the suit says. Additionally, the suit says Fleet knew for years about the potential of harm from the product but did not take action to notify doctors and patients until February 2005.

Goza took the Phospho-Soda preparations as instructed for the screening.

“Within days of using the Fleets Phospho-Soda,” the suit says, “Ms. Goza had an increase in her blood pressure and developed severe headaches.”

Lab work ordered by her physician found that her creatinine - a measure of kidney function - was more than three times normal. Other markers indicating worsening kidney function also were detected.

The suit said evaluation by a nephrology clinic determined “she had suffered acute renal failure because of Fleet Phospho-Soda, compounded by the presence of blood pressure medicine.”

The suit says a 2005 letter from Fleet to doctors cited reports of cases of renal failure linked to the bowel cleanser, and included a reference to a report in the New England Journal of Medicine of a 71-year-old woman who had developed a rare kidney condition following use of the Phospho-Soda.

However, the suit says, Fleet knew years earlier that kidney problems could arise with use of the product. “Only after twelve years of negative journal articles raising safety and efficacy concerns about (Fleet’s Phospho-Soda) did Defendant decide to issue a warning.”

Had she had complete warnings, said the suit, Goza “would have recognized the danger and not taken the product. However, because there was no such warning, she developed renal failure after consuming the product.”

Norfolk attorney Jeffrey A. Breit, whose law firm represents Goza, said in an interview that the 65-year-old has suffered permanent kidney damage “and will have consequences the rest of her life.”

Several law firms are listed on the Internet as seeking patients who’ve been injured by Fleet’s Phospho-Soda to join a class action suit.

Breit said that Virginia law prohibits class action suits in state courts, but said other patients might be added as individuals to the Goza case.