Bone screws. Yeah, we’d have to say we know a bit about them. And Pennsylvania law – we know something about that as well. Put those two together, and that’s why the Pennsylvania Superior Court’s recent decision in Wiggins v. Synthes (U.S.A.), ___ A.3d ___, 2011 WL 3524286 (Pa. Super. Aug. 12, 2011), just seems screwy to us. Wiggins affirmed a significant jury verdict against the manufacturer of some bone screws that, when used in the hip joint, broke when there was a non-union (that is, adjacent bones were supposed to heal and knit together, but didn't).
Neither of the Superior Court’s two most critical medical device product liability decisions is even cited in the Wiggins opinion. Those are: Creazzo v. Medtronic, Inc., 903 A.2d 24 (Pa. Super. 2006), and Schindler v. Sofamor, Inc., 774 A.2d 765, 771 (Pa. Super. 2001) (yup, Bexis and Michelle did that one).
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