>Abbott Laboratories Settlement
Date Filed: November 16, 1999
Court: U.S. District Court
Location: Illinois
Ticker Symbol: ABT

Abbott Laboratories, a leading manufacturer of medical diagnostic tests and pharmaceutical products, was hit with four more lawsuits filed by women claiming that one of the company's most common testing procedures returned flawed results, leading to unnecessary cancer treatments including chemotherapy and a hysterectomy.

Filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago, the suits contended that the Abbott-hCG test kit, used with its AxSYM testing machine falsely reported high levels of the hormone human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). High levels of hCG indicate pregnancy, but in absence of pregnancy can be an indicator of serious medical conditions including a rare form of cancer called trophoblastic disease.

The suits were filed on behalf of four women who said they underwent unnecessary medical treatments based on flawed results from the Abbott tests. These suits joined three others filed in 1999 by Berman against Abbott involving the same issue.

These suits claimed that Abbott Labs violated a number of laws including negligence, breach of implied warranty and negligent infliction of emotional distress.

Other resources include: www.falsepositive.org for more information regarding this issue.



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