Pittsburgh Legal Issues Blog

Manufacturing companies are responsible for building and selling safe products that do not present unnecessary dangers to consumers. However, these companies are not perfect, and sometimes, they are prone to negligence. When this negligence results in design errors, construction errors or the use of dangerous materials that cause injury to consumers, those who are injured may be able to pursue financial damages in court.

Among the many types and varieties of consumer product liability cases, here are some of the most common examples:

• Negligently designed and built vehicles and vehicle parts
• Negligently designed bicycles, motorcycles, recreational vehicles and sporting equipment
• Unsafe appliances, power tools and machinery
• Unsafe and contaminated food products that cause sickness and illness to those who consume them
• Dangerous children's toys, children's clothing and other children's accessories like cribs, furniture, car seats and more
• Potentially deadly and dangerous pharmaceutical drugs that result in hazardous side effects
• Inadequately labeled dangerous products that do not warn consumers of known dangers

Nowadays, more and more people are coming forward to talk about asbestos-related injuries they suffered while working Pennsylvania coal mines, steel mills or other factories. If you work in an old school building or lived near one of these businesses when they were in their prime, you and your family may be at risk for asbestos-caused illnesses as well.  

Asbestos is difficult to detect because it is microscopic. You must do special tests to determine if it is present. If you are exposed to asbestos even a single time, you are at risk. Although, studies show that certain situations pose more of a danger than others. If you have an incurable illness, there is nothing you can do to restore your health, but you can take steps to seek justice if someone's negligence was a causal factor in your injury.  

A broken femur bone is rare because it's the largest and strongest bone in the body, but in a catastrophic motor vehicle accident, the crushing forces are strong enough to break any human bone – including the femur. Unfortunately, injuries like this usually require a painful, months-long road to recovery, that includes surgery, physical rehabilitation and a certain degree of suffering.

Taking as long as six months to heal, the mending of a fractured femur could be a slow, arduous – and expensive – process. Therefore, car accident victims with this kind of break need to be patient as their bodies go through the following healing steps:

1. Inflammation: The swelling and inflammation of the broken bone area are normal and part of the healing process.
2. Regeneration: The bone will begin to regenerate through the growth of new bone structures.
3. Remodeling: The bone goes through a "remodeling" process as the new bone structures mature and solidify.

The life-saving and pain-reducing benefits of prescribed drugs have helped millions throughout the world. However, these medicines are not always completely safe and free from risks. In each case, a doctor must evaluate a particular medication to determine if its potential benefits outweigh the risks involved with taking it.

Some drugs are poisonous to the human system and no one should ever take them. Through the efforts of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), as soon as these drugs are identified, they are immediately removed from the market. The Fen-Phen diet pill is just one such dangerous medication that was linked to heart problems, strokes and death in some people who took it. This was a clear case of a medicine that did not achieve a benefit that came close to the risk of death involved with taking it.