A Medical Device Daily

Medtronic, (Minneapolis) reported that a securities class-action lawsuit against the company was dismissed by U.S. District Judge Richard Kyle in Minneapolis.

The complaint, which was filed initially by Stanley Kurzweil on behalf of all shareholders and amended on April 18, 2008, after consolidation with other similar shareholder suits, involved the company's October 2007 withdrawal of its Sprint Fidelis defibrillator leads.

In a 42-page ruling, Kyle analyzed each of the allegations against Medtronic and concluded that, even assuming the allegations were true, they could not support a claim for securities fraud under the laws governing shareholder class actions.

Kyle also ruled that the plaintiffs may not amend their complaint.

In other legalities, A jury awarded $2.6 million to the family of a 60-year-old woman in a medical malpractice lawsuit against Memorial Hospital of Carbondale. The verdict came after a one-week trial in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois. Marvin Brustin and Milo Lundblad of the Chicago law firm of Brustin and Lundblad represented the decedent's family.

The family's attorneys argued at trial that the decedent and her husband were in southern Illinois visiting their son and his family for Mother's Day weekend in May 2004 when she became ill with a fever. While being examined in the hospital's emergency department on Saturday evening, blood samples were taken and sent to its laboratory to be tested for bacteria.

At 7:15 the following morning, Mother's Day, the emergency room charge nurse was told by the laboratory that the blood cultures were positive for bacteria indicating a serious infection. Instead of telling the emergency room doctor of this critical finding, the nurse, pursuant to the hospital's policy and procedure, put the lab report in a folder that was placed on the doctor's desk.

The lab report sat on the desk for 12 hours without being reviewed by a doctor. In that time, the decedent and her husband drove back to the Chicago area and immediately went to the emergency room of their local hospital because she was not feeling well. The decedent's infection was caused by E. coli bacteria and quickly worsened due to her age and diabetes. Despite treatment, the decedent died the next morning, Monday.