August 9, 2016 — The federal judge overseeing 5,500 testosterone lawsuits has picked a case involving a man who had a heart attack after using AndroGel for the first “bellwether” trial in July 2017.
On August 3, U.S. District Judge Matthew F. Kennelly issued an order (PDF) naming 8 lawsuits to go before a jury — 4 involving heart attacks and 4 involving deep vein thrombosis or pulmonary embolism.
After trials involving AndroGel, Judge Kennelly will pick another set of trials involving other testosterone products like Testim, Axiron, and Androderm. All of the lawsuits are centralized at the federal level in Multi-District Litigation (MDL No. 2545) in Illinois.
The first trial will involve Jeffrey Konrad, a man from Tennessee who started using AndroGel 1% in May 2010. He was diagnosed with hypogonadism and had a history of heart disease. In July 2010, he had a heart attack at the age of 49 — Case No. 1:15-cv-00966.
Soon after his heart attack, the New England Journal of Medicine published the first study linking testosterone and heart attacks. In the study, 23 men on testosterone had a heart attack vs. 5 men in the placebo group. All of the men were over 65 and had limited mobility.
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