The morning began like any other. “My son was getting ready for work, and he said to me ‘Mom, you don’t look too well.’ When I went to the emergency room, they found a blood clot on my lung.
“Four days later that blood clot had led to complete renal failure, heart attack, congestive heart failure. They had to resuscitate me. They put a stent in my heart.
“I don’t remember any of this. I was in a coma for four days. The endocrinologist wrote on my chart in big bold letters: STOP THE AVANDIA.”
Amy Lynn Evans, a 52-year-old former pharmacy technician from Pinellas County, Florida, is one of tens of thousands of Americans who suffered complications after taking GlaxoSmithKline’s blockbuster drug Avandia.
She speaks rapidly, the words spilling out like an avalanche. Her longing for someone -- anyone -- who will lend a sympathetic ear is palpable.
Before beginning the drug, she recalls, “I was constantly on the go.” She took the drug on the advice of her physician, after he diagnosed her with type 2 diabetes. Asked if she had any symptoms, she laughs sardonically and replies “Not a single solitary one!”
She was discharged after spending 29 days in the hospital. She still suffers from the after-effects of heart failure, renal failure, and pancreatic failure. Attorneys for GlaxoSmithKline offered $400 thousand dollars to settle her case. Her lawyer demurred, assuring her “I can dig more money out of them.” She ended up collecting $18 thousand. After her lawyer collected his share, she netted five thousand.
“My medications are over two thousand dollars a month,” she notes.
Hot on the heels of the Avandia debacle, is history about to repeat itself?
Source
Amy Lynn Evans, personal interviews 27 February and 3 March 2014.
