Bard PowerPort Lawsuit

May 11, 2026: First Bard PowerPort Trial Ends in Partial Defense Verdict and Hung Jury on Design Defect

The first Bard PowerPort bellwether trial ended with a partial defense verdict and a hung jury on key issues. The jury found that Bard and Becton Dickinson were not liable on the failure to warn and failure to instruct claims. The jury also rejected the consumer fraud claim. So on those claims, the defense won.

But the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict on whether the Bard PowerPort was defectively designed or whether the companies engaged in unlawful trade practices. Defective design is one of the central theories in the PowerPort litigation. So while Bard can call this a defense verdict, it was not a clean win on the core product defect theory.

The reported details make the result less damaging for plaintiffs than the headline sounds. Jurors reportedly indicated they would have answered yes if asked whether the PowerPort could have been made safer. Company employees also testified that they had recommended design updates, and testimony addressed Bard’s knowledge of infection risk.

The lesson is that infection cases, at least some infection cases, are harder than fracture and migration cases. Bard won the claims the jury decided, but the design defect issue was not resolved. The next bellwether trials are now even more important.

May 9, 2026 – Jury Deliberations

The jury began deliberations yesterday and already asked the judge four questions. They will resume on Monday.

April 27, 2026 – PowerPoint Comes into Evidence

Judge Campbell issued a ruling today admitting a key internal PowerPoint presentation into evidence with partial redactions.

The document, drawn from Bard’s own internal files, covers infection rates, the feasibility of antimicrobial coatings, and the impact of infections on cancer patients. The court found these issues highly relevant to the case. Bard had objected to the entire exhibit under Rule 403, which allows courts to exclude evidence when the risk of unfair prejudice substantially outweighs the evidence’s probative value.

The judge agreed with Bard on one narrow point. Several pages of the presentation referred to Bard as the market’s “King.” The court concluded that the language could cause a jury to react emotionally to Bard’s boastful internal wording rather than focus on the actual merits of the case. Because the plaintiff had already introduced other evidence of Bard’s market dominance, the “King” references added little value while creating a real risk of prejudice. Those pages will be redacted before the jury sees the document.

The rest of the exhibit comes in unchanged, which is good news for plaintiffs. The court also left open the possibility that the plaintiff could argue for admission of the “King” references during the punitive damages phase of the trial, which we will hopefully get to.

The jury did not hear testimony today but will return tomorrow.

April 21, 2026 – Opening Statements in Arizona

Opening statements began today in the first bellwether trial over Bard PowerPort catheter infections. Plaintiff attorneys told jurors that Bard knew for decades that its devices were dangerously prone to infection and chose profit over patient safety.

The plaintiff, a Minnesota cancer patient, developed a serious infection from his port catheter in 2022. He was hospitalized for six days and had his chemotherapy delayed by two weeks. His attorneys told the jury that Bard had developed safer technologies, including antimicrobial coatings and smoother catheter materials, as early as 2005, but repeatedly shelved them. Internal company documents showed Bard knew its catheters were too rough. By 2020, attorneys said, more than 30 safer alternatives existed, and Bard had acted on none of them.

April 17, 2026 – How a Bard PowerPort Settlement Could Work

No settlement had been announced as the first trial approached. If Bard eventually proposes a global resolution, our lawyers expect a tiered program that pays more for documented fractures, migration, embolization, vascular injury, and severe infection complications. Claims involving minor or short-lived injuries would likely receive lower offers.

Any settlement agreement would establish its own participation and opt-out rules. Plaintiffs with strong cases would need to compare the certainty and timing of a settlement offer against the risks and delay of continuing toward an individual trial.

April 16, 2026 – The Trial Is Upon Us

The Bard PowerPort litigation reaches its first real test starting April 21, when jury selection begins in the District of Arizona before Judge Campbell. Forty prospective jurors have been called for voir dire after the initial pool was thinned through hardship excusals and questionnaire screening. The court is clearly moving forward on schedule.

The pretrial rulings tell an interesting story. Judge Campbell refused to let Bard and Becton Dickinson argue that FDA 510(k) clearance established that the device was safe. The 510(k) process asks whether a device is substantially equivalent to something already on the market. It is not an FDA finding that the device is safe, and the ruling prevents Bard from leaving jurors with that impression.

The defense also lost an expert whose usefulness depended on responding to witnesses who are not testifying, leaving a hole in its scientific case.

Plaintiffs did not walk away clean. The Memorial Sloan Kettering email they wanted to use as evidence of early manufacturer awareness is not coming into evidence. Without a sufficient foundation showing the company formally relied on those concerns, the judge kept it out. That is a real loss for the story plaintiffs wanted to tell about what Bard and Becton Dickinson knew and when they knew it.

The Avertex alternative design issue now shapes up as the trial’s defining fight. If plaintiffs can convince the jury that a safer catheter existed and was practical to manufacture, the liability case gets significantly stronger. The defense will spend considerable time arguing the opposite.

Liability and compensatory damages will be decided first by the jury. Punitive damages only come into play if plaintiffs win.

March 21, 2026 – Big Expert Win

Judge Campbell handed plaintiffs an important evidentiary win by trimming back what Bard’s FDA expert, Kimberly Trautman, can tell a jury.

Plaintiffs moved to block several parts of Trautman’s testimony, arguing Bard was trying to turn a regulatory witness into a safety witness (which they definitely were).

The judge agreed in part. The biggest ruling for plaintiffs is that Trautman will not be allowed to tell jurors that Bard’s port design was safe or that FDA clearance through the 510(k) process means the devices were safe and effective. She also cannot testify about the FDA’s state of mind, offer general opinions about port complication rates, compare ports to other central venous access devices as supposedly better options, or speculate about DuPont’s warning in its Delrin material safety sheet, legislative history, or FDA intent. The ruling limits Bard’s ability to use a regulatory expert to deliver a broader product-safety opinion.

Trautman can still explain FDA processes, discuss complaint handling and certain reporting issues, and offer opinions on regulatory compliance, labeling, the ASR program, and antimicrobial coating review, subject to limits. But those are minor issues that are harder to challenge. The take-home message is that the court blocked Bard from using its FDA expert to deliver the message that the PowerPort was safe simply because it remained on the market or made it through 510(k) clearance. For plaintiffs, that keeps the focus where it belongs: on what the device allegedly did to real patients, rather than letting Bard hide behind a regulatory halo.

February 22, 2026 – Big Expert Ruling on Friday

Judge Campbell issued a mixed decision on Bard’s attempt to knock out two of the plaintiffs’ key medical experts. The judge allowed interventional radiologists Dr. Darren Hurst and Dr. Jeffrey Weinstein to testify in important areas, but cut back portions of their opinions that Judge Campbell believed strayed beyond their clinical expertise.

This was not the sweeping exclusion Bard was seeking. The court rejected the argument that the doctors’ reports were improper simply because plaintiffs’ counsel helped draft them. Lawyers and experts work together on reports. Because the doctors substantially participated and adopted the opinions as their own, the testimony survived.

The judge drew the line on opinions about corporate knowledge, regulatory duties, and alternative engineering designs. The doctors may testify within their clinical expertise, but they may not offer corporate-state-of-mind or engineering opinions.

So that is not great. But the core of the case remains intact. Bard managed to trim some branches, but the trunk of the expert testimony is still standing.

January 28, 2026 – When You Need a Port-a-Cath

Lawyers involved in this litigation sometimes forget the context of these cases as we grind it out in discovery against Bard. Port failures are not isolated events. They derail treatment. They cause delays in chemotherapy. They lead to emergency surgeries. They introduce sepsis risks in patients whose immune systems are already compromised.

That is the problem. Dealing with a defective PowerPort is just one more thing on top of many things for these patients. A delayed infusion or a forced removal of a port can change outcomes in ways that never show up cleanly on a damages spreadsheet. Lawyers talk about causation. Patients experience fear, pain, setbacks, and the constant anxiety that the very device meant to help them is now another threat.

January 18, 2026 – Status Conference

The 24th MDL Case Management Conference will be held on February 19, 2026, at 1:00 p.m. Arizona time. The conference will be held on Zoom.

Everyone would like to see this litigation move more quickly in 2026. Hopefully, a trial will be completed in the first half of 2026, putting these cases in a better position to settle. The Cook trial is still set to go off in February.

September 27, 2025 – PowerPort Lawsuit

In a most recently filed PowerPort claim, a woman from St. Petersburg, Florida, has joined the MDL, suing Bard, Becton, Dickinson, and related entities.

The plaintiff alleges that she was implanted with a PowerPort device on two occasions (April 17, 2008, and May 21, 2009) while residing in South Jordan, Utah. She claims that the device caused severe complications, including catheter fracture and thrombosis.

The lawsuit adopts numerous claims from the MDL’s Master Complaint, including strict liability and negligence related to design and manufacturing defects, failure to warn, breach of warranties, misrepresentation, fraudulent concealment, and consumer fraud. She is also seeking punitive damages and has demanded a jury trial.

August 30, 2025 – New Lawsuit

In a new lawsuit in the MDL, a woman from Santa Fe, Texas, alleges that a Bard PowerPort device surgically implanted in her chest led to severe and preventable injuries. According to the complaint, the device’s catheter fractured inside her body, causing infection, thrombosis, and other complications that required medical intervention.

The plaintiff had the PowerPort implanted to facilitate regular vascular access for treatment. But not long after implantation, she began experiencing symptoms consistent with device failure, including pain, swelling, and signs of infection. Medical imaging later revealed that the catheter had broken apart. She underwent corrective procedures to address the issue, but alleges ongoing complications and permanent damage.

August 20, 2025 – Bellwether Trial Schedule

The Bard Implanted Port Catheter MDL continues to move forward with steady progress. On Friday, the court held its 19th case management conference, and Case Management Order No. 38 was issued a few days later to outline the next steps.

At that time, the judge adopted a bellwether schedule calling for trials to begin in 2026. The schedule has since changed. The first trial began in April 2026, and the current five-trial sequence extends through February 2027.

August 1, 2025 – New Schedule

The parties in the Bard PowerPort MDL jointly filed a motion yesterday to amend Case Management Order No. 33 regarding the bellwether trial schedule for Miller v. Bard (24-cv-00612), part of Bellwether Group 1. The proposed changes arise from delays in testing the plaintiff’s explanted port catheter, which arrived at the lab in liquid form and must be dried before non-destructive testing can proceed. To avoid disrupting summary judgment and Daubert deadlines, the parties agreed to modify only the interim expert disclosure and deposition dates for this specific case.

Under the amended schedule, the plaintiff’s materials expert disclosures will move from August 4 to August 25, and defendants’ responsive materials expert disclosures will shift to September 22. Additional dates are set for supplemental disclosures and rebuttals, including deadlines for non-material experts who rely on the delayed testing. Expert depositions are now set to begin on October 13, while all dispositive and exclusion motions remain due on October 28, preserving the broader litigation timetable.

This is a targeted schedule adjustment, not a delay of the overall MDL track. It reflects a practical accommodation for evidence processing rather than a sign of discord among the PowerPort lawyers. Both sides framed the request as essential to keeping the case on sound footing without interfering with the larger bellwether calendar.

July 19, 2025 – What Is the Cook Case About?

We should talk about the plaintiff’s lawsuit in Cook because that will be the first trial to get underway.

This is an infection case. In August 2022, the plaintiff underwent implantation of a Bard PowerPort at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, for chemotherapy administration related to rectal cancer. Less than two weeks later, he was hospitalized at United Hospital in St. Paul, where the PowerPort was surgically removed due to infection. A PICC line was placed to allow IV antibiotic treatment.

The complaint alleges that the device was defectively manufactured and designed, resulting in surface degradation that facilitated microbial growth and infection. The plaintiff asserts that neither he nor his physicians were adequately warned of the risk of infection, particularly the specific risks associated with the catheter’s material composition. The filing claims Bard knowingly concealed these dangers and continued to market the product as safe despite mounting adverse event reports involving infections, device fractures, and vascular perforation.

As a result of the device failure, the plaintiff suffered emotional distress, physical injury, unnecessary surgery, and increased risk of future harm.

July 2, 2025 – The Strongest PowerPort Lawsuits

Not all lawsuits in the PowerPort litigation carry the same weight. While many claims are valid and rooted in real harm, certain cases stand out as especially strong, both factually and legally.

The most compelling claims tend to involve patients who received a BardPort or AngioDynamics port within the last ten years and then experienced serious complications. These include device fractures, leaks, or migration. Such mechanical failures can lead to blood clots, infections, pulmonary embolisms, and surgical removal of the device.

Even more persuasive are cases where the implant system caused more severe conditions: sepsis, endocarditis, internal bleeding, lacerated blood vessels, or perforation of organs or tissues. When a device intended to deliver treatment instead causes life-threatening complications and forces invasive interventions, the underlying claim becomes much more substantial from both a medical and legal perspective.

June 26, 2025 – Plaintiffs Win Expert Battle

On the expert disclosure front, Judge Campbell ruled that Bard must revise its Rule 26(a)(2)(C) summaries for 16 witnesses. For three key witnesses (Christian, Powers, and Schuessler), Bard’s original summaries were too vague, saying what the witnesses might say instead of what they are expected to say.

Big difference. That is not good enough under the rules. For the other 13 witnesses, Bard simply cited depositions without summarizing the expected testimony, which also violates disclosure requirements. All these summaries must now be revised and submitted by July 18, ahead of the scheduled depositions.

May 6, 2025 – Bard PowerPort Trial Plain Articulated By Judge

Judge Campbell provided critical direction on the upcoming bellwether case selections.

Following the sixteenth case management conference, the court tentatively outlined the composition of the six cases it expects to proceed to early trial. Specifically, the Court indicated a preference for a mix of case types, including three involving infections, two involving thrombosis, and one involving a device fracture.

Additionally, the selection should include four cases involving polyurethane devices, one involving a Groshong catheter, and one involving a silicone device. The judge also emphasized that at least one selected case should involve surgical complications.

This framework is intended to ensure a representative cross-section of claims for early resolution and to aid in assessing the broader liability landscape. The parties were instructed to confer, attempt to reach an agreement on the six primary bellwether cases and one alternate, and file their response memoranda by tomorrow.

April 30, 2025 – The Path to Trial (which is the path to a PowerPort Settlement)

The parties in the Bard Port Catheter MDL have submitted their proposed bellwether trial selections. Although the tone of the filings suggests disagreement, both sides agree on key points. Each side supports the inclusion of three infection cases and at least one thrombosis case. They also jointly selected the Miller case, involving a polyurethane catheter and a thrombosis injury, as a representative trial. The main point of contention concerns the remaining case slots, particularly the number of fracture cases and the types of catheter materials involved.

Plaintiffs argue, with reason, that a truly informative bellwether slate must reflect not only the most common injuries but also key factual differences across the inventory. They propose including two fracture cases to capture the distinction between subclavian and internal jugular placement, which is central to the design and warning defect issues. They also highlight the overlap between infection and thrombosis injuries, noting that a verdict in an infection case may provide insights into how juries view Bard’s design choices more broadly. Defendants, on the other hand, rely on raw percentages and argue that the slate should be limited to polyurethane catheters, which comprise approximately 75 percent of the MDL inventory.

The dispute is not simply about numbers. It is about whether early trials should reflect the full range of real-world injuries or focus only on the statistical middle. The court’s selection will influence the usefulness of the bellwether results in evaluating appropriate settlement compensation in the broader litigation. The parties agree on the structure but remain far apart on what types of cases will best inform the resolution.

March 15, 2025 – Status Conference on Thursday

The Bard Implanted Port Catheter multidistrict litigation continues to move forward, with the court holding Case Management Conference No. 15 this upcoming Thursday. On Tuesday, lawyers must submit a joint memorandum outlining the schedule for important case milestones, including fact discovery, expert reports, and key motions. This document will provide a roadmap for the bellwether cases, which will help determine how future trials and potential settlements may unfold.

During the conference, plaintiffs’ attorneys raised concerns about Bard’s failure to produce the necessary complaint files in 18 cases, in violation of prior court orders. In response, the court ordered Bard to correct this issue before the next conference. This development serves as a reminder that even large corporations must comply with court directives, and failure to do so can result in consequences.

Plaintiffs must ensure they are doing their part. While most plaintiffs are fulfilling their court-ordered obligations, some have struggled to submit required profile forms. One plaintiff repeatedly failed to meet deadlines and had her case dismissed with prejudice, meaning she cannot refile it. The court has not placed a heavy burden on individual plaintiffs thus far, and cooperation with attorneys is essential. If a plaintiff has a legitimate reason for missing a deadline, such as a medical issue, that can be accommodated, but you have to notify the court rather than simply failing to respond.

Bard’s legal team is now seeking to recover legal fees from plaintiffs who experienced delays in submitting their profile forms. The court has agreed to allow briefing on the issue before making a ruling. This request is an unnecessary distraction, as shifting legal costs to plaintiffs over minor administrative delays serves no real purpose other than to intimidate claimants.

February 18, 2025 – New PowerPort ISP Fracture Lawsuit

In a new lawsuit, a Reno, Nevada, plaintiff is suing Becton, Dickinson, and Company and its related entities, alleging that a defective Bard PowerPort ISP M.R.I. Implantable Port caused severe medical complications. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada, claims that Yates received the port in March 2023 and later suffered a catheter fracture, leading to serious health issues.

According to the complaint, the PowerPort ISP M.R.I. was designed to provide long-term vascular access but was defectively manufactured and prone to material degradation. The lawsuit alleges that the catheter component of the device fractured inside Yates’s body, creating a significant risk of infection, thrombosis, and other medical complications. The plaintiff contends that the defendants knew, or should have known, of the risks associated with the device but failed to adequately warn patients and medical providers.

The lawsuit asserts claims for strict liability due to design and manufacturing defects, negligence, failure to warn, fraudulent misrepresentation, and violations of consumer protection laws. The plaintiff seeks compensatory and punitive damages for medical expenses, pain and suffering, and other losses, arguing that the defendants prioritized profit over patient safety by continuing to market a dangerously flawed medical device.

As we talk about below, we think the fracture cases are particularly strong.

January 13, 2025 – AngioDynamics MDL

The new AngioDynamics Port Catheter MDL, which mirrors the PowerPort litigation, currently involves 90 chemo port lawsuits. Our lawyers are not taking these cases. We think they are viable, but the litigation is too small to get involved.

December 31, 2024 – Judge Narrows Scope of Corporation Depositions

In one of his first substantive rulings in the PowerPort MDL, Judge Campbell required plaintiffs’ counsel to narrow the scope of their plan for deposing corporate representatives of Bard, now part of Becton Dickinson. Judge Campbell found that the initial deposition requests were excessively broad and would have been overly burdensome. In an order entered just before the holidays, Judge Campbell identified the topics on which plaintiffs could question Bard’s corporate representatives.

December 20, 2024 – Plaintiffs’ Experts

What will plaintiffs’ experts say at trial? Plaintiffs are expected to rely heavily on biomedical engineering experts to explain the material defects of Chronoflex AL and its tendency to degrade. These experts will testify that the inclusion of barium sulfate, a radiopaque additive intended to improve imaging visibility, undermines the catheter’s structural integrity. They will explain that barium sulfate produces microfractures within the Chronoflex AL material, leaving it vulnerable to cracking and, ultimately, bacterial colonization that leads to the infections reported.

November 26, 2024: New Thrombosis Lawsuit

In a new lawsuit filed Friday in MDL-3081, the executor of the estate of a California man is suing the Bard entities after his use of a Bard PowerPort implantable catheter device caused complications like catheter fracture, infection, and thrombosis.

Although the man has died, this is not a wrongful death lawsuit. The plaintiff does not claim her father died from these complications. Instead, the lawsuit seeks compensation for his medical bills and pain and suffering from his use of the defective device before his death.

November 25, 2024: Why Does the PowerPort MDL Have Fewer Than 700 Plaintiffs?

Let’s break down the numbers in the Bard PowerPort MDL to get a sense of its potential scale. Approximately 300,000 PowerPort devices were implanted nationwide, and Bard commanded an estimated 70% share of the market. Based on those figures, there could potentially be anywhere from 8,000 to 12,000 cases of complications stemming from these devices. Yet as of now, only 640 lawsuits have been consolidated in the MDL. Why the disparity?

The most obvious explanation was that the Bard PowerPort litigation remained relatively new. Patients may not connect catheter-related infections, fractures, or migration to the PowerPort itself. Doctors may also have difficulty identifying the device as a cause because implanted port complications can have several possible explanations.

Will this change? That remains to be seen.

February 23, 2024: Two Suggestions of Death Filed in PowerPort MDL

Two suggestions of death were filed in the Bard PowerPort MDL that month, underscoring the need to move claims involving seriously ill plaintiffs efficiently.

A suggestion of death formally notifies the court that a party has died. The estate or another proper representative may need to be substituted, and the pleadings may need to be amended to assert survival or wrongful death claims under the applicable law.

November 20, 2023: MDL Judge Continues To Push Lawsuits Forward

Judge Campbell continues to push the Bard PowerPort catheter lawsuits forward.

What are bellwether trials? A bellwether trial is a legal process where a small number of cases are selected from a larger group of similar lawsuits to be tried first. Usually, the MDL judge will preside over these early trials. If the lawsuits go to trial – there may be a global settlement before we ever get to a trial – the outcomes of these trials are used to predict trends and calculate PowerPort settlement amounts for the remaining cases in the larger group.

The trial plan involves both parties exchanging lists of 24 cancer port lawsuits (a total of 48) by July 1, 2024, to form the initial plaintiff pool. From this pool, after an initial discovery process, 15 cases will be chosen for what they are calling Discovery Group 1 by December 17, 2024. Each party will select five cases, and the remaining five will be chosen jointly.

If you are not familiar with mass tort litigation, this may seem slow-moving. But the proposed schedule was relatively fast for an MDL of this size.

October 2, 2023: Bard PowerPort MDL Assigned To Judge David Campbell

The new Bard PowerPort MDL has been assigned to Judge David Campbell in the U.S. District Court for Arizona. Judge Campbell is a conservative appointed by President Bush in 2003. He was in private practice in Phoenix before being appointed to the bench and is widely respected.

August 12, 2023: Federal Panel Centralizes Bard Port Lawsuits in an MDL

As expected, we now have a Bard PowerPort MDL. A federal panel of judges has ruled that Bard PowerPort lawsuits filed in federal court will be consolidated under a single judge in an MDL.

Centralization allows the parties to conduct coordinated discovery and obtain consistent pretrial rulings. It can also make eventual settlement negotiations more manageable, although an MDL does not guarantee a settlement.

The MDL number is 2:23-md-03081.

July 25, 2023: JPML to Hear Arguments on Bard Port Centralization

We will take the next step to a Bard PowerPort MDL. The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) is poised to hear oral testimony this week on whether to centralize a (sort of) Bard PowerPort MDL under a single judge for coordinated discovery and pretrial proceedings.

This process, known as Multidistrict Litigation (MDL), can benefit plaintiffs. In recent months, product liability lawsuits have surged across various U.S. District Courts nationwide, each alleging complications from Bard PowerPort or comparable Bard implantable port catheter systems, which are implanted beneath the skin to facilitate simplified medication delivery, such as chemotherapy.

The advantage of consolidating these cases into an MDL lies in the increased efficiency and consistency in rulings, which can lead to fairer outcomes for victims. Moreover, MDL helps avoid duplicating discovery efforts, reducing litigation costs for plaintiffs.