Report Slams Response to Metal Hip Troubles (MedPageToday)
Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic were slow to inform patients and their doctors about problems with metal-on-metal hip implants and relied on industry officials and consultants in crafting their responses, the BMJ charged.
According to a report appearing online in BMJ, regulators in the U.K., the U.S., and elsewhere should have prevented "a whole class of failing hip implant [sic] from being used in hundreds of thousands of people globally."
The report is based on an investigation commissioned by the journal and the BBC's Newsnightprogram.
BMJ investigations editor Deborah Cohen reported that the U.K.'s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) first became aware of problems with metal-on-metal implants in 2006, but it was not until 2010 that the agency issued a formal warning to physicians and the public. Complications included high failure rates and possible systemic effects from elevated metal ion levels in the blood.
On Tuesday, just hours before the BMJ report was set for publication, the MHRA issued an advisory to surgeons, telling them that patients who have received metal-on-metal implants s...
