Depo-Provera Side Effects May Increase Risk of Rare, Severe Blood Clots, Case Report Warns

Shortly after receiving a Depo-Provera injection, a young woman suffered from severe blood clots in both lungs, doctors report.

After examining a 21-year-old woman who suffered multiple pulmonary embolisms, a group of doctors are warning about a risk of potentially severe deep vein thrombosis that may be caused by side effects of Depo-Provera birth control shots.

The Depo-Provera shot has been widely marketed as a safe and effective form of birth control since 1992. It is a quarterly injection which has been used by more than 70 million women in the U.S.

Concerns about the injection’s safety arose last year after studies found a link between Depo-Provera and meningioma risks, with new data showing that some women may face a more than five times higher risk of developing the dangerous brain tumors.

However, in a case report published in Cureus on February 21, researchers from Cape Fear Valley Medical Center report a new potentially dangerous side effect of the Depo-shot known as phlegmasia cerulea dolens (PCD), which is a rare and severe form of deep vein thrombosis (DVT) that may be caused by restricted blood flow from the limbs after receiving the birth control injection.

In the new case report, Dr. Shadrack Ansong and a team of researchers outling an incident involving a 21-year-old female patient who was suffering from numbness, pain and swelling in her lower extremities, as well as chest pain and shortness of breath. She had recently received a Depo-Provera injection.

Diagnostic tests revealed that she had an extensive blood clot and was suffering bilateral pulmonary embolisms, meaning that multiple blood clots had lodged into both lungs. This resulted in the need for extensive medical treatment.

“The patient underwent a series of interventions, including thrombectomy, catheter-directed thrombolysis, and repeat thrombectomy with venoplasty. She was discharged on anticoagulation therapy and showed favorable outcomes during her hospital stay,” they reported. “This case highlights the potential association between Depo-Provera use and the development of PCD, emphasizing the importance of prompt diagnosis, multidisciplinary management, and follow-up care.”

The findings come less than two weeks after a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) indicated that Depo-Provera carried the highest risk of serious blood clots, compared to all other types of hormonal contraceptives.

Depo-Provera Brain Tumor Lawsuits

Prior to this case report, most of the recent safety concerns have focused on Depo-Provera brain tumor risks, which have led to dozens of lawsuits in recent months brought by women diagnosed with intracranial meningiomas after receiving the injections.

Earlier this month, about 70 such lawsuits were consolidated for coordinated pretrial proceedings in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida before U.S. District Judge M. Casey Rodgers as a Depo-Provera multidistrict litigation, or MDL.

However, the size and scope of the litigation is expected to rapidly expand over the coming months, as more women discover that brain tumors diagnosed in recent years may be the result of Depo-Provera side effects.

Now that the Depo-Provera lawsuits have been consolidated into an MDL, all current and future claims brought in any federal court will be transferred to Judge Rodgers for coordinated discovery, pretrial motions and potentially a series of early bellwether test trials.

Following coordinated discovery and pretrial proceedings in the MDL, if the parties fail to reach a Depo-Provera settlement or another resolution for each of the brain tumor lawsuits, each individual lawsuit may later be remanded back to the U.S. District Court where it was initially filed for an individual trial in the future.