Mesothelioma Lawyers Blog

April 3, 2015

FDA Approves New Mesothelioma Treatment for Orphan Drug Status

Mesothelioma is a deadly disease for which there is no cure. There are treatments that can be used to extend a patient’s life for a matter of months, or, in the best cases, years. However, once a patient is diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma, he or she usually only has a very short time left to live.

The reason for this is because of the manner in which asbestos affects the human body and how mesothelioma develops. Once a person is exposed to deadly asbestos fibers, these fibers can become trapped in a person’s lungs or other internal organs. They can become embedded in the lining of a protective layer of tissue known as the mesothelium.

At this point, the fibers are virtually impossible for doctors to detect early on. Even if they could, there is as of right now nothing doctors can do to remove them or treat a victim.

Over a relatively long period of time, about 20 to 50 years, the asbestos particles will metastasize into malignant mesothelioma. However, this is not to say all victims will be elderly by the time mesothelioma presents itself. There have been cases where young children were exposed to asbestos when their parents or other family member living with them came home from work covered in asbestos fibers. Children would hug their parents and breathe in the fibers.
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April 1, 2015

Indirect Asbestos Exposure and Mesothelioma

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

Asbestos has been used heavily during much of the last century in almost all aspects of production and construction. While many factory jobs and construction jobs involve working directly with asbestos, there are some jobs thought to be relatively safe from asbestos exposure. One of these safer construction jobs is sheet metal work.

Sheet metal workers typically handle projects working only with the metal and not coming in direct contact with asbestos-containing material like wall insulation or pipe insulation, some of the most likely sources of material emitting deadly asbestos fibers.

Unfortunately, many of these workers have been exposed to asbestos indirectly, and, while indirect exposure might seem safer, a recent study published in the

March 30, 2015

New Type of Asbestos Class Action Lawsuit

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

When someone is exposed to asbestos and inhales fibers, it normally takes between 20 and 50 years for the fibers to lead to malignant mesothelioma. Patients typically do not realize they are sick until they develop symptoms. Symptoms can include abdominal pain, shortness of breath, and chest pain. Once a patient develops these or other symptoms of mesothelioma and sees his or her doctor, they often learn the disease is in an advanced stage. Life expectancy is significantly reduced upon diagnoses of mesothelioma.

However, a recent news article from the Kansas City Star discusses a new kind of asbestos class action lawsuit pending in a court in Missouri. In 1983, the county started renovating the historic courthouse. Witnesses describe an extreme amount of dust covering the courthouse during the renovations while workers were still there full-time during the process. There were reports of dust being tracked across the floor by workers’ boots. Some reports told of dust shooting in through air vents as renovation workers cut asbestos insulation away from pipes without turning off the ventilation system.

One courthouse worker who was present during the renovation developed malignant mesothelioma and died in 2010 at age 56. After her death, her family received a $10.4 million settlement from the county.
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March 28, 2015

Asbestos Continues Delay in Opening New Boston Homeless Shelter

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

With the unscheduled closing of Boston’s Long Island Homeless Shelter, city officials have been scrambling find a new location to house hundreds of displaced homeless residents and many drug rehabilitation patients.

The shelter was closed when the bridge connecting Long Island to Quincy became so deteriorated city engineers urged it immediately be closed to prevent a deadly accident. The worst damage requiring the bridge to close was found on the underwater support structures during an extended inspection. With the island effectively cut off from the mainland, there was no way to keep the shelter open, and city officials were forced to close it with little advanced warning or preparation.

The city hopes a new shelter under renovation and remodeling will serve as permanent housing for the over 700 former residents at Long Island. This new shelter is being constructed at what was once a plant where transportation department workers conducted equipment repair and made street and road signs. This plant is filled with asbestos used during its construction. Much of this asbestos was already crumbling down as a result of years of deterioration and insufficient upkeep.
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March 26, 2015

City Cautions Urban Explorers About Exposure

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

If you search the internet for “urban explorers” you will see websites dedicated to those who spend their spare time sneaking into abandoned buildings in cities across the United States taking photographs of what sometimes appears to be a window into the past.

One of the locations these urban explorers like to frequent is located in Westborough, Massachusetts. Specifically, this location is the long-closed Westborough State Hospital.

The abandoned 90-acre campus holds the crumbling remains of what was once part of the state psychiatric hospital. The old hospital buildings were used for over a hundred years and officially closed in 2010.

According to a recent news article from Wicked Local Westborough, urban explorers have taken photographs of rooms that have not been touched in years. Some of these rooms hold psychiatric equipment not used in decades. There are old rusty hospital gurneys, antique wheelchairs, large rooms filled with bathtubs, and other signs of how mental illness was treating during the early 1900s.
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March 24, 2015

New Defense Asserted in Mesothelioma Litigation

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

There is no question that malignant mesothelioma is extremely rare absent exposure to asbestos. Basically, if a doctor makes a diagnosis of mesothelioma, it is presumed in virtually every case the disease was caused by exposure to the toxic fibers. The next issue that comes up is finding out the source of exposure, and doctors will conduct an extensive work history of patients to determine when and where asbestos exposure occurred.

However, according to a recent article from the Madison-St. Claire Record, corporate defendants in mesothelioma injury lawsuits are trying to claim a certain genetic marker, if present in plaintiff, made this person significantly more likely to develop mesothelioma than those without the gene.

It is the BAP1 gene corporate defendants are saying makes a plaintiff much more likely to develop the deadly form of cancer. A researcher from the University of Hawaii believes BAP1 gene can increase the chance a person will develop mesothelioma and can actually cause mesothelioma. While this theory was first presented in 2011, this year is the first time lawyers are seeing it presented as a defense in mesothelioma cases.
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March 22, 2015

Millions at Stake as Major Asbestos Trial Begins

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

According to a recent report from Fairfield Daily Republic, one asbestos trial is garnering a lot of attention from corporate leaders. This trial involves a former shipyard worker who is dying of cancers caused by his occupational exposure to asbestos.

This trial is expected to take many weeks to complete and is seen by those in the industry as a measuring stick for how juries feel about asbestos and mesothelioma lawsuits. What makes this case different than many others is that this California county is well known for returning verdicts in favor of defendants. Plaintiff’s attorneys are hoping, and feel confident, this might not be the case when the jury finally reaches a verdict in this matter. Corporate defense lawyers filled the courtroom to watch opening statements and get a sense for what the jury was thinking.

As for the plaintiff himself, he is 68-years-old and was diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma in mid-2013. He was a machinist who worked on submarines and ships at a California shipyard before retiring in the early 1990s. During the course of his employment, he was routinely exposed to asbestos dust.
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March 20, 2015

New Study Shows Suspected Breast Cancer May be Mesothelioma

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

Many people think mesothelioma is a type of lung cancer. While mesothelioma is a cancer that can occur in the lungs, it is not considered lung cancer. Mesothelioma occurs when a patient inhales asbestos fibers and those fibers become embedded in a layer of protective tissues known as the mesothelium.

Over a period of 20 to 50 years, these fibers can metastasize into malignant mesothelioma. Mesothelioma can be found in the lungs, chest, abdomen, and other organs where mesothelium is present and can spread to other organs where it is not.

While it is easy for doctors to distinguish mesothelioma from lung cancer, it is not always so easy to determine whether a patient is suffering from breast cancer or mesothelioma, according to a new study published in the World Journal of Surgical Oncology.

The new study began when a 49-year-old woman presented with a three-centimeter hard lump in the layers of tissue of her right breast. Oncologists performed a biopsy and sent the removed tissue to a laboratory so histology could be performed.
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March 19, 2015

Asbestos at Martha’s Vineyard Library Site Causes Delays, Costs

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

Residents of Martha’s Vineyard, a town on the Cape south of Boston, have been eagerly awaiting the opening of the library budgeted to cost a quarter of a million dollars at the time bids were awarded. The problem now facing contractors is it is now estimated to cost nearly half a million dollars to complete the project, due to unforeseen delays including discovery of asbestos on the job site, according to a recent news article from MV Times.

When contractors had their bid approved and began work, the project was quickly halted when water begin filling the excavation site for the library foundation. The water was coming up from the water table below, and, for some reason, this was not anticipated at the time plans were approved. It cost builders and engineers over $100,000 to fix water table issues before construction could be resumed.

Once the water table issue had been resolved, contractors unearthed an underground storage tank, which had to be painstakingly removed and the resulting vacant hole filled in with suitable material. At this point, there were problems with the fence erected around the project. After tackling these new issues, and at very great expense, contractors then found pipes believed to be insulated with now friable asbestos material.
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March 18, 2015

Jamaica Plain Residents Worried About Asbestos Exposure

by Jeffrey S. Glassman

Resident’s of Boston’s Jamaica Plain neighborhood are extremely worried about asbestos exposure during demolition of the Casey Overpass, according to a recent news article form the Jamaica Plain News.

The Casey Overpass is part of Boston’s Arborway, which was part of Fredrick Law Olmsted’s plan in the 1890s to construct a carriageway connecting a series of parks, which have come to be known as the Emerald Isles. While the roadway was originally a great enhancement to the city, modern development and heavy traffic has far surpassed the capacity of the roadway, leading to a need for a massive overhaul of the aging transportation system.

As part of this overhaul, Commonwealth officials proposed demolishing the existing Casey Overpass, which is apart of the Arborway. This has many residents concerned they will be exposed to cancer-causing asbestos dust during the demolition project.
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