Accutane Lawsuit Filed in Canada Over Bowel Problems from Acne Drug

A mass tort lawsuit filed in Ontario, Canada, alleges that side effects of Accutane, a popular acne medication, causes users to suffer inflammatory bowel disease (IBD)

The Accutane lawsuit was filed in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice by Jennifer Twamley, who has been diagnosed with ulcerative colitis after using the acne medication.

The complaint seeks mass tort status, based on the belief that thousands of Canadians could have similar claims for bowel problems caused by Accutane.

Did You Know?

Change Healthcare Data Breach Impacts Millions of Customers

A massive Change Healthcare data breach exposed the names, social security numbers, medical and personal information of potentially 100 million Americans, which have now been released on the dark web. Lawsuits are being pursued to obtain financial compensation.

Learn More

Roche, the manufacturer of Accutane, faces thousands of similar lawsuits in the United States, and the company cited the mounting costs of the Accutane litigation as one of the reasons they stopped selling the drug in this country in 2009. However, generic Accutane equivalents are still available in the U.S. and Roche still sells the name brand drug in Canada.

Twamley indicates that she began taking Accutane when she was 17. She has now been diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, which the lawsuit alleges has caused severe problems for the 33 year old, affecting her social life and career as a television producer. The lawsuit claims Roche failed to warn users about the potential risk of bowel disease from Accutane.

Known generically as isotretinoin, Accutane has been used by more than 16 million people worldwide since it was first introduced in the early 1980s. The brand name version was removed from the market amid mounting litigation over Accutane, which raises similar allegations that the drug maker failed to adequately warn about the risk of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), which includes ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease.

More than 7,000 Accutane bowel disease lawsuits are pending in New Jersey state court, where the cases are centralized for “mass tort treatment” before Judge Carol E. Higbee.

Several bellwether trials held in New Jersey have resulted in multi-million dollar damage awards for individuals who developed IBD from Accutane, finding that Roche failed to properly warn patients or the medical community.

Ulcerative colitis is an inflammatory bowel disease that affects nearly 700,000 Americans, impacting the lining of the intestines and colon. Symptoms of the disease include abdominal pain, blood in the stool, diarrhea, fever, fatigue and weight loss and is typically treated with corticosteroids, immunomodulators or Remicade if patients do not respond to other treatments.

0 Comments

Share Your Comments

I authorize the above comments be posted on this page*

Want your comments reviewed by a lawyer?

To have an attorney review your comments and contact you about a potential case, provide your contact information below. This will not be published.

NOTE: Providing information for review by an attorney does not form an attorney-client relationship.

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

More Top Stories

Hair Relaxer Lawsuit Status Conference To Be Held With MDL Judge This Week
Hair Relaxer Lawsuit Status Conference To Be Held With MDL Judge This Week (Posted 2 days ago)

U.S. District Judge presiding over all federal hair relaxer lawsuits will meet with lawyers involved in the litigation on Thursday, to discuss the status of the claims and when to move forward with bellwether cases.

Lawyers Propose MDL Trial Dates for Baby Formula NEC Lawsuit Starting in May 2025
Lawyers Propose MDL Trial Dates for Baby Formula NEC Lawsuit Starting in May 2025 (Posted 3 days ago)

A series of four bellwether claims in the baby formula NEC lawsuit MDL will be ready to go before a federal juries in May 2025, August 2025, November 2025 and February 2026 according to a proposed trial schedule agreed upon by both plaintiffs and defendants.