Ross Feller Casey Files Nation's First Xarelto Lawsuit Alleging Once-A-Day Dosage Led To Stroke

PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 8, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Following months of investigation, Ross Feller Casey, LLP has filed the first lawsuit in the nation alleging that the anticoagulant Xarelto's recommended dosage doesn't work for as long as promised, sometimes with life-threatening results.

The firm filed a lawsuit today in state court in Philadelphia on behalf of a Florida man who suffered an ischemic stroke because the drug didn't work as the manufacturer suggested. Ross Feller Casey is preparing to file numerous other suits shortly on behalf of clients from across the country with similar claims.

Xarelto, approved in 2011, has rapidly become a blockbuster drug, with more than $1.3 billion in U.S. sales in 2013. Those sales are due in large part to the drug's recommended once-a-day dosage, less than its competitors.

Xarelto (rivaroxaban) is manufactured and marketed in a partnership between Janssen Pharmaceuticals (a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary) and Bayer HealthCare. The drug has been linked to severe, uncontrollable bleeding events, and Ross Feller Casey has already filed more than 60 cases involving those injuries.

Unlike those cases, the suit filed today is believed to be the first in the country to allege that Xarelto does not prevent, and may actually have contributed to, ischemic strokes in clients suffering from atrial fibrillation. The case alleges that the indicated 20mg dose results in a lack of protection against stroke/systemic embolism for a substantial window of the day if the dose is given once-per-day.

Xarelto is the only new anticoagulant recommended by the manufacturer for once-per-day dosing in the clinical setting of non-valvular atrial fibrillation. All other comparable anticoagulants are dosed on a twice-per-day basis.

Mark Hoffman, M.D., an attorney with Ross Feller Casey, states "Xarelto's rapid half-life, which was touted by its manufacturer as an advantage over the older, yet more proven, warfarin therapy, as well as the drug's pharmacodynamic properties, often leaves a substantial portion of a patient's 24-hour period with no protection against clots whatsoever."  Hoffman, who, with Brian McCormick, Jr., is handling these lawsuits for Ross Feller Casey, has recently been appointed to the Plaintiffs' Steering Committee for the Xarelto litigation in federal court in New Orleans.

To learn more about Ross Feller Casey visit http://www.rossfellercasey.com/

SOURCE Ross Feller Casey, LLP