Off-Label Use

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We’ve been waiting quite a while for the FDA to modernize its positions on the truthful off-label communications by regulated manufacturers.  Under current First Amendment practice, the FDA’s positions are quite likely unconstitutional as both speaker- and topic-based restrictions on the truthful communication of scientific information.  However, the best we’ve seen from the Agency to date was a “statement,” issued last June, that truthful off-label communications to third-party payers (or “payors,” if you’d rather) would henceforth be OK.  Further details were available in an FDA guidance issued at the same time.  We blogged about that statement here.

The June 2018 guidance, however, did not go beyond TPPs.  Id. at 22.  We editorialized at the time:

We fail to see how any constitutionally valid distinction can exist between providing the identical information, with identical disclaimers and limitations, to one “sophisticated” audience (third-party payors) while prohibiting that information’s distribution to another “sophisticated” audience – that being medical doctors that directly prescribe these drugs and devices. . . .  Thus, we believe that, as a practical matter, the OLP Guidance effectively dooms any First Amendment defensibility of an FDA ban on the same truthful information being distributed, in the same fashion, to the rest of the medical community. . . .  After all, just as third-party payers are sophisticated professionals . . ., so are the doctors directly involved in treating [their] patients.

Then, nothing.  Over the last eight months we’ve seen no detectable movement through either FDA guidance documents or, the pending process – a reassessment of which was announced two years ago (see our post here) – to amend the FDA’s archaic “intended use” regulations.

We’re not surprised that a lot of other people are tired of the FDA’s foot-dragging.  Among other things, the FDA stated in that guidance we mentioned above that it would be deferring to “existing current good research practices for substantiation developed by authoritative bodies.”  Guidance at 10.

One of those “authoritative bodies” is the Advanced Medical Technology Association (“AdvaMed,” for short), which describes itself as “a trade association that leads the effort to advance medical technology in order to achieve healthier lives and healthier economies around the world.  AdvaMed’s membership has reached over 400 members and more than 80 employees with a global presence.”  One of the things AdvaMed has done is to create a code of ethics for medical device manufacturers.  The last AdvaMed code was issued about a decade ago and was in need of updating.  So AdvaMed has prepared a new ethics code that’s due to become effective on January, 1, 2020.  The entire code is methodically discussed in a Reed Smith client alert, but for present purposes we’re interested section 10, entitled “Communicating for the Safe & Effective Use of Medical Technology.”

Full disclosure, as stated in the client alert: “Reed Smith was honored to serve as outside counsel to AdvaMed in connection with drafting the original, current, and revised versions of the AdvaMed Code.”

Section X of the new AdvaMed Code starts with a specific description of off-label use, so it’s obvious to all what the code is discussing:

Health Care Professionals may use a product for any use that they determine is in the best medical interests of their patients.  This includes uses that are contained in the Medical Technology’s labeling or otherwise consistent with such labeling, but it could also include uses that are not approved or cleared (i.e. “off-label” uses).  As recognized under U.S. law and by the FDA, off-label use of these Medical Technologies can be an important part of medical practice and may even constitute a medically recognized standard of care.

2020 AdvaMed Code at 29 (emphasis added).  One “key concept” that this section of the new AdvaMed code emphasizes is that “[a]ccess to truthful and non-misleading information relating to Medical Technologies is critical to a Health Care Professional’s ability to exercise his or her medical judgment, to provide high-quality care, and to safely use available Medical Technology.”  Id. (emphasis added).

Thus, AdvaMed has stopped waiting for the FDA and is taking the position that direct off-label communications between medical device manufacturers and the physicians (and other health care professionals) that use their products is 100% ethical if done in a truthful, transparent, and non-misleading fashion:

Industry appropriate communications of such information can include, among other activities:

  • Proper dissemination of peer-reviewed scientific and medical journal articles, reference texts, and clinical practice guidelines;

  • Presentations at educational and medical meetings regarding clinical trial results or research and development data for an investigational use (taking care that no claims are made regarding safety and effectiveness); and

  • Discussions with consultants and Health Care Professionals to obtain advice or feedback relating to topics such as unmet patient needs, product research and development, and the like.

Id.  AdvaMed’s ethical guidelines for such communications (which the FDA would call “promotion”) are about what one would expect a company with good marketing practices to employ generally – authorization, truth, and disclaimers:

  • Company responses that contain information regarding unapproved or uncleared uses should be provided by authorized personnel.

  • Company communications must be truthful and nonmisleading.

  • Information related to unapproved or uncleared uses should be identified as such.

Id. at 30.

Thus AdvaMed – one of the “authoritative bodies” to which the FDA has stated it would be deferring – has stepped up to the plate and declared that truthful manufacturer communication of off-label information to physicians and other health care practitioners is both ethical and desirable.  “Companies are encouraged to develop policies and controls that apply the principles above.”  Id.

FDA, the ball is in your court.  Either take command or lose control.  Industry is not going to wait forever for the Agency to bring its regulation of truthful commercial speech into the Twenty-First Century.

Moreover, from a litigation standpoint, the AdvaMed Code is what we call an “industry standard” (at least when it goes into effect in 2020), and in almost every jurisdiction in the country, compliance with industry standards is admissible evidence in product liability cases.  “[I]ndustry standards promulgated by trade associations” are “acceptable” as evidence in strict product liability cases.  Kim v. Toyota Motor Corp., 424 P.3d 290, 299 (Cal. 2018).  “[T]rade associations consist of manufacturers and other businesses whose conduct comprises the industry custom and practice.”  Id.  Accord, e.g., Adams v. Genie Industries, Inc., 929 N.E.2d 380, 385 (N.Y. 2010) (“weight” of an “industry standard for” the product “was up to the jury”); Mikolajczyk v. Ford Motor Co., 901 N.E.2d 329, 335 (Ill. 2008) (“conform[ance] with . . . guidelines provided by an authoritative voluntary association” held relevant to proving a “unreasonably dangerous” defect); Wash. Rev. Code §7.72.050(1) (“[e]vidence of custom in the product seller’s industry . . . may be considered by the trier of fact”).  So now, when plaintiffs start bleating about “off-label promotion” being such a horrible thing, we have evidence to point to that – provided it’s done correctly and in compliance with a company’s internal guidelines – such activity is recognized as proper and ethical.

Oh, yes, and Happy Valentine’s Day to everyone at the FDA.  Among other things, they keep the nation’s chocolate supply safe.

We all know the phrase “the elephant in the room.” There are some things that do not get mentioned that are so obviously relevant that silence about them, or willful ignorance of them, can be humorous or frustrating. Based on our not-so-extensive research, we see that the origin of the fairly widespread use of this phrase is disputed, possibly dating to Russian fable that was referenced in a Russian novel. Not being terribly invested in the issue, we did not go to the original sources to try to understand the facts. We also are not going to detail all of our prior discussion on why the First Amendment cannot be ignored in evaluating claims of liability based on alleged off-label promotion of approved/cleared drugs and devices. Because of the First Amendment, activities “promoting” an off-label use are not automatically wrongful, like they were once construed to be. Truthful statements are protected commercial speech. False and misleading statements are not. Whether in a criminal case brought by FDA, a False Claims Act case where the United States has intervened, a consumer fraud class, a third-party payor case, a product liability case, or something else, we would think that a presiding court would be wise to go beyond the label “off-label promotion” and see if the liability is supposed to be based on truthful statements or false statements.

The First Circuit decision in In re Celexa and Lexapro Marketing and Sales Practices Litigation, — F.3d –, 2019 WL 364019 (1st Cir. Jan. 30, 2019), does not mention the First Amendment. It makes no attempt to distinguish between purportedly culpable conduct that involved statements that were truthful versus those that were false. Versions of the word “truthful” are missing, “false” only appears in discussing cases under the False Claims Act, and “misleading” appears once. Back when the First Circuit issued its lousy trilogy of Neurontin decisions, before Amarin had played out and FDA effectively acknowledged truthful off-label promotion was lawful, we might have expected such inattention to this distinction. It is hard to justify it now, however. It is also hard to justify how the decision glossed over the underlying facts.

The district court issued a number of decisions before the appeal, including the denial of class certification we discussed here and the granting of summary judgment we discussed here. Only two of the plaintiffs from below perfected their appeal and the appellate decision did a little picking and choosing of what it addressed. We will do the same and focus on the summary judgment part, which was reversed. (The class certification denial was upheld because the class claims were time-barred. If you want to read about American Pipe tolling and how unsealing a FCA complaint where the U.S. had intervened can start the RICO clock, then check out 2019 WL 364019, **8-10.) The remaining plaintiffs sought recovery under RICO and Minnesota state consumer fraud and unfair trade practice statutes, although only RICO is analyzed. The first plaintiff is described by the First Circuit as having “purchased Celexa and Lexapro for her young son from February 2003 through March 2010 on the recommendation of her son’s neurologist.” Id. at *3. We know from the decision below that these were prescriptions to treat autism from age 8 through 15 and that the treating physician testified that the drugs were effective in the boy’s case. The second plaintiff was a union health fund that included pediatric use of Celexa and Lexapro on its formulary, but had paid for a small portion of pediatric claims for all indications submitted for Celexa from 1999 to 2004 (16/72, 22%) and for Lexapro from 2002 to 2015 (31/234, 13%). Id. at *2 & n. 8-9. Each sought reimbursement—an unknown amount for the first plaintiff and about $26,000 for the second—and RICO penalties for paying for these prescriptions under the theory that defendants had promoted the use of Celexa and Lexapro for depression in patients under 18 and that payment for these drugs constituted an economic injury because they allegedly were not proven to be effective for depression in patients under 18.

If you are following along, then you might see some issues here and why we pointed out that not going to the original sources to get the facts can hamper an analysis. In the manner of a lazy orator, we will pose some of these issues as questions we will not answer. What sort of economic injury exists when you get the product you paid for at the price you intended to pay? For a third-party payor that negotiates the prices it pays and obviously decided whether to pay on a claim-by-claim basis—choosing not to do so 78-87% of the time—how can there be an economic injury and how could it be analyzed except on a claim-by-claim basis? How can the use of a drug for autism, effective per the doctors who kept prescribing it, be based on whether the drug was effective for depression in any age population? Why would cases involving such low amounts of purported actual damages get pursued so aggressively? Given that every off-label prescription here was written by a doctor who knew it was off-label and had the right to write the prescription anyway, how can there be liability? The court did not provide clear answers to most of these questions either.

Operating under the Neurontin framework, the court started with the premise that all promotion (undefined) for off-label uses was wrongful and proceeded to characterize the record as “strongly suggest[ing] that Forest engaged in a comprehensive off-label marketing scheme from 1998 through 2009 aimed at fraudulently inducing doctors to write pediatric prescriptions of Celexa and Lexapro when Forest had insufficient reason to think that these drugs were effective for the treatment of depression in children and adolescents.” Id. at *2. More specifically, the defendant was alleged to have promoted the use of both drugs for pediatric depression in various ways and to have concealed “negative clinical studies concerning Celexa’s efficacy and safety.” Id. Again, none of the allegations seemed limited to false and misleading statements or focused on the impact on the particular prescriptions—for autism and more general pediatric use—for which plaintiffs claimed injury. In addition to recounting that the manufacturer pled guilty to criminal FCA charges on off-label promotion and settlement of related civil FCA claims—before the First Amendment shift—the court noted some relevant FDA history. “In 2009, the FDA approved Lexapro for the treatment of depression in adolescents (i.e., individuals of ages twelve through seventeen).” Id. at *1. FDA also determined that one of the pivotal studies that it considered in approving Lexapro as safe and effective for depression in adolescents also applied to use of Celexa for pediatric depression. Id. at *4. Plaintiffs offered various criticisms of this and other studies, which the court generally credited as supporting that the drugs were ineffective for pediatric depression. It failed to note something the district court had noted when it granted summary judgment: FDA had and considered all the study evidence that plaintiffs claimed showed the opposite of what FDA found. That makes it really hard to prove their case without inviting the jury to conclude that FDA got it wrong.

Preemption, you say. RICO is a federal statute, so the Supremacy Clause does not apply. Whether the Minnesota statutes would be preempted was not examined. What was examined, without labeling it primary jurisdiction, was whether “the FDA’s various pronouncements or actions close the door on any effort to convince a jury that either Celexa or Lexapro was ineffective.” Id. We do not think that was the right question to ask, but the court got the wrong answer anyway. In concluding that the plaintiffs were free to invite the jury to second-guess the FDA’s conclusion that Lexapro was effective for pediatric depression (and related conclusions), the court missed the big picture. The court found its ruling in D’Agostino, which affirmed the dismissal of a FCA case predicated on fraud-on-the-FDA, did not apply because the manufacturer “could not have pleaded on FDA approval” when it allegedly promoted off-label use. Id. at *5. We do not see what reliance has to do with allowing second-guessing of FDA. The court also found its ruling in an earlier appeal from the same litigation, which held that a consumer claim based on an approved label and no new safety information was preempted, did not apply because, well, it was about preemption.

From there, the court’s reasoning escapes us—although we do appreciate the nod toward the relevance of FDA evidence to state law claims:

The common law has long recognized that agency approval of this type is relevant in tort suits. See Restatement (Third) of Torts: Prod. Liab. § 4 (Am. Law Inst. 1998) (“[C]ompliance with an applicable product safety statute … is properly considered in [a product defect case].”). But the common law also recognizes that such evidence is not always preclusive. Id. (“[S]uch compliance does not preclude as a matter of law a finding of product defect.”). And while there are strong reasons for treating such evidence as preclusive when the challenged sales are made in reliance on agency approval, those same reasons cut the other way when the sales are made without approval, and certainly when made unlawfully, as we must assume they were here.

Id. at *5. Consistent with such fuzzy reasoning, it was not unexpected that the court would find that the evidence of lack of efficacy that plaintiffs had was enough to raise a question of fact.

The leap from a dispute about efficacy in general to economic injury for the plaintiffs was not really explored. Nor was how the individual plaintiff—the mother of autistic child—could prove causation. How the union health fund could prove causation was addressed and we will not dwell too much on it here. Suffice it to say evidence tending to say promotion increased prescriptions in general was seen as more probative than evidence about what the fund actually did in connection with the less than fifty prescriptions it reimbursed. Talk about ignoring the elephant in the room.

 

As we roll out of bed on the day after Thanksgiving, we are often confronted with contradictory thoughts. For instance, “why did I have that third plate at dinner?” might be followed by “How can I eat some leftovers for breakfast?”  Leftovers are as much of an American tradition on this day as watching videos of altercations during frenzied early holiday shopping. Both celebrate wretched excess in their own way. Some leftovers, however, can be combined to create something tasty and worthwhile. Other leftover uses should not be attempted. We would put sandwiches of turkey, stuffing (dressing down South), and cranberry goop in the former category and Brussels sprouts omelets in the latter.

A while back, for a few years, we chronicled a real turkey of a case called Howard. The saga is recounted here, where the plaintiff’s expert was finally kicked for the unreliability of his defect opinion about the PMA device at issue in the case. Along the way, the case generated two notably foul (fowl?) opinions. Deciding on preemption in the context of a theoretical claim, the Sixth Circuit held that a negligence per se claim could be a parallel claim and avoid express preemption.  Years later, on a referred question, the Oklahoma Supreme Court okayed a negligence per se claim under Oklahoma law based on violations of the FDCA.  That gobbler took home the ribbon for third worst of 2013.  Our well-documented view that there can be no negligence per se claims based on violations of the FDCA notwithstanding, Oklahoma now has a claim that came from a case that was soon to be plucked and exposed as lacking merit.

A few years later, the plaintiffs in Cantwell v. De La Garza, No. CIV-18-272-D, 2018 WL 5929638 (W.D. Okla. Nov. 13, 2018), sued an implanting orthopedic surgeon, non-profit health care system, and medical device manufacturer for alleged injuries from the alleged off-label use of a PMA medical device in a spinal surgery. The manufacturer moved to dismiss. We do not have many details of the underlying facts or allegations, but we are focusing on the negligence per se claim—the leftover from the Howard turkey, in case you missed our less-than-subtle theme. A few weeks before the Oklahoma Supreme Court’s decision in Howard, the Western District of Oklahoma rejected the purported parallel claims in Caplinger. After a motion to reconsider was denied, the Tenth Circuit affirmed in Caplinger v. Medtronic, Inc., 784 F.3d 1335 (10th Cir. 2015), one of our favorite preemption decisions and a 2015 winner.  In part because that decision was authored by future Justice Gorsuch, we have drilled down on Caplinger a few times and tracked its impact.

The Cantwell plaintiffs claimed that the manufacturer had promoted the device to be used off-label—it was approved for use in the thoracolumbar spine, but was used in the cervical spine—and that violated apparently unspecified provisions of the FDCA and its regulations. Under the Oklahoma Supreme Court’s decision in Howard, “To establish negligence per se, the plaintiff must demonstrate the claimed injury was caused by the violation [of a statute], and was of the type intended to be prevented by the statute . . . [and] the injured party [was] one of the class intended to be protected by the statute.” Pretty much the hornbook definition, along with the requirement that the plaintiff prove breach, causation, and damage. In the context of pleadings and the Howard decision, the court went back to basics. Plaintiffs did not plead a particular statute or regulation that had been allegedly violated, let alone that could be tied to the injuries attributed to the device at issue. Howard did not lower the pleadings bar: “The court said nothing to suggest, however, that a plaintiff wishing to bring such a claim could proceed without identifying the statute or regulation allegedly violated, and thus the duty allegedly breached by the defendant’s conduct.” Looking to Caplinger and the unaddressed but obvious issue of preemption, the court noted that “such identification is particularly important in the area of medical devices, where a state-law negligence claim must survive the FDCA’s provision of a federal preemption device.” So, no identified allegedly violated federal statute or regulation meant no properly pleaded claim for negligence per se. Citing to the FDCA in general or invoking the loaded term “off-label” was not enough to get past a motion to dismiss. Predictably, though, the dismissal was without prejudice, so we expect plaintiffs will try again. If they do, then we would not be surprised if Justice Gorsuch’s former colleagues on the Tenth Circuit get another chance to weigh in on express preemption with a re-heated version of Howard.

Although they have nothing to do with the Affordable Care Act, health-care-related so-called “death panels” do exist.  These panels are operated by state agencies and private health insurance companies, and they decide whether to reimburse as “medically necessary” (or some similar definition) any type of medical care that comes into question.  They’re an unfortunate necessary – quackery should not be reimbursed.  But such panels used to reject any form of off-label use, until states and the federal government passed laws and regulations telling them that they couldn’t.  As we’ve explained elsewhere, off-label use can frequently represent the medical standard of care.

But in Harborth v. State, ex rel. Dep’t of Workforce Services, ___ P.3d ___, 2018 WL 4011635 (Wyo. Aug. 22, 2018), we ran into one of the limits to those protections – and to off-label use – that we haven’t seen in a published opinion in quite some time.  Something isn’t “off-label” when there is no FDA-approved label at all. The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed a coverage denial of therapy involving the implantation of a medical device that had never been approved by the FDA for labeling and marketing for any intended use whatsoever.

How could that happen?

The FDA only regulates prescription medical products in the United States.  In Harboth, the claimant had a history of chronic back problems.  Ultimately the state worker’s compensation panel approved a rather expensive and involved surgical procedure:

a foraminotomy at L4-5 and transforaminal lumbar interbody fusions (TLIF’s) at both L5-S1 and T12-L1.  [Claimant] testified that [the recommended] surgery would cost approximately $400,000.

2018 WL 4011635, at *1.

Before agreeing to cover this surgery, the state required “two peer reviews.”  Id.  That took some time, and in the interim, the claimant got cold feet.  Id. at *2.  She was also in “excruciating pain” waiting for worker’s comp. to make up its mind.  Id. at *3.  The claimant investigated various treatments for her condition online, and learned about “artificial disc replacement surgery using the ‘M6’ artificial disc.”  Id. The surgeon who performed this procedure was in Germany.  The claimant crossed the pond and had the surgery.  Not only was it “successful,” but it cost a fraction of the $400,000 that the “death panel” was prepared to pay for the other type of surgery.  Id. at *4 (surgery was “appeared to be a success”), *10 (“surgery cost[] $340,000 less than [the initially proposed] procedure”).

The state’s version of a “death panel” nonetheless “denied compensation for the surgery, finding that it was not reasonable and necessary medical treatment.”  Id. at *3.

Why?

Because it could. The relevant reimbursement guidelines authorized payment for “off-label use,” but the M6 device had only received governmental approval for use in the European Union, and not from the FDA. Id. at *3 (“there has been no United States FDA approval of the M6-L disk replacement system”).

If the surgery had really been “off-label use” (ironically, a basis for the denial of the claim by the panel), then the claimant may have had a chance:

Rules recognize optional approaches to verifying that a procedure or device lacking FDA approval is reasonable and necessary. . . .  For “off-label use of medical services,” the health care provider must submit a comprehensive review of the medical literature supporting the off-label use, including “at least two (2) reliable prospective, randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind trial[s].”

Harborth, 2018 WL 4011635, at *5 (citations to various rules omitted).

But the procedure had to involve “off-label use” in order to fit under these rules.  “‘Off-label use of medical services’ is defined as:  ‘Medications, treatments, procedures or other medical services used for other than the approved Food and Drug Administration (FDA) indications.’  Id. at *6 (citation and quotation marks omitted).  Off-label use is OK:

[O]nce the FDA has cleared a device for introduction into the stream of commerce, physicians may use the device in any manner they determine to be best for the patient, regardless of whether the FDA has approved the device for this usage.  This practice by physicians is known as “off-label” usage.

Id. (citation and quotation marks omitted).  But for the use of a device to be “off-label,” that device must first have been approved for marketing and labeling by the FDA for something.  The M6 wasn’t:

“[O]ff-label” medical service [i]s one that deviates from a use that has been approved by the FDA. . . . Under . . . the Division Rules, the plain definition of “off-label” use does not encompass the surgical implantation of an M6 artificial disc adjacent levels. The M6 artificial disc is not approved for any use by the FDA.  Thus, there is no “label” from which a medical provider may deviate.

Id. (citations and quotation marks omitted) (emphasis added).

Because the rules and regulations under which the state’s workers compensation system operated were “clear and unambiguous” in defining off-label use, nothing else mattered.  It didn’t matter that the claimant appeared to have a better prognosis (she returned to work, which was questionable under the other surgical alternative).  It didn’t matter that the surgical option the claimant pursued saved the state hundreds of thousands of dollars.

[Claimant] urges us to consider the success of her surgery as documentation of its safety and effectiveness. . . . [I]t may be tempting to weigh the actual outcome of surgery into the determination of compensability. Because [she] underwent surgery costing $340,000 less . . . and returned to her previous work duties with no restrictions and no pain medication, the evidence of her outcome is especially compelling. However, . . . it would be unreasonable to view the outcome of a medical procedure as a factor that trumps all others. [The] . . . Rules do not award compensation for medical treatments only if they are “successful” . . .; instead, in order to receive medical benefits, a claimant must show that his treatment is “reasonable and necessary.” A patient might fail to respond to reasonable and necessary medical treatment; and, likewise, a patient may benefit from elective, “unnecessary” medical treatment.

Id.  Anecdote, unfortunately for this claimant, is not data.  “A claimant’s successful surgery is only a single instance of success, and is not a substitute for objective and verifiable medical data demonstrating the procedure’s overall record for safety and effectiveness.”  Id.

It’s been a long time since we’ve seen a court draw this distinction.  In Gaston v. Hunter, 588 P.2d 326, 330 (Ariz. App. 1978), the court held that informed consent rules applicable to off-label use do not apply to an “experimental” medication that had not yet received FDA approval for anything, and was still under clinical investigation.  Similarly, in Retkwa v. Orentreich, 584 N.Y.S.2d 710 (N.Y. Sup. 1992), it was not off-label use to employ “liquid injectable silicone” in surgery where the material was not being sold as a medical device at all (a prior opinion in the same case called it “non-medical grade”).  “It is a reasonable assumption that most patients, confronted with a doctor’s recommendation for injection of a foreign substance, presume that such substance has been the subject of official testing, consideration, and approval.”  Id. at 712 n.6.

Whatever ones opinion of the third-party payor would-be “death panels,” and whether or not the “ends” in Harborth should have justified the means, the decision is a reminder that not everything that doctors do with FDA-regulated prescription medical products fits neatly into the two categories of “labeled use” (called “intended use” by the FDA) and “off-label use.”  With the Internet making ever more medical information (and disinformation) available without regard to national borders, we would not be surprised to encounter more cases where the distinction drawn in Harborth is relevant.

We’ve complained before about the federal government’s monetization of First Amendment violations in the context of truthful promotion of off-label uses:

[T]he government has ruthlessly monetized its questionable ban on truthful off-label promotion for quite a few years now. Indeed, the government has used this ban as the basis for a creeping administrative takeover of pharmaceutical and medical device public relations practices.  Don’t believe us?  Just take a look at the Office of Inspector General’s list of “corporate integrity agreements.”

Then, in the wake of the First Amendment win in Amarin Pharma, Inc. v. FDA, 119 F. Supp. 3d 196 (S.D.N.Y. 2015), we noted an interesting provision in the settlement that ended that litigation:

. . .[N]othing in this Order shall be construed to limit Amarin’s to free speech concerning Vasepa.

That got us thinking, and we commented about OIG’s corporate integrity agreements (“CIAs”) in the wake of a hypothetical First Amendment invalidation of the FDA’s ban on truthful promotion of off-label uses:

Well, come the millennium, those CIAs – most of them, anyway – will still be there. What then? Will the government take the position, again backed by threats of debarment, that regardless of the First Amendment, companies have limited their rights voluntarily by what they agreed to in particular CIAs?

We thus recommended addition of First Amendment non-waiver provisions in all future deals with the government that touched upon off-label promotion.  After all, the government has hardly been consistent in its positions regarding the First Amendment and truthful off-label promotion.

We hope all of you out there were listening, because the federal Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) recently made just such a waiver argument in an action, Patient Services, Inc. v. United States, No. 3:18-cv-00016-MHL, pending in the Eastern District of Virginia. Patient Services does not involve a CIA or off-label promotion, but the arguments are the same.  According to the complaint in Patient Services:

  1. PSI is a non-profit charitable foundation that operates Patient Assistance Programs (“PAPs”), which provide financial and other assistance to indigent patients who have chronic and often life threatening diseases that require expensive treatment and management. . . .  Since 2002, OIG has provided public guidance directing how PAPs should be structured and operate in accordance with its view of the Anti-Kickback statute.

  2. Specifically, since 2002, and like all other PAPs, PSI has operated pursuant to an Advisory Opinion from OIG that provides specific guidance as to how PSI should operate and structure its programs to avoid a risk of an enforcement action. . . . The 2017 Modified Advisory Opinion, however, imposes new and oppressive restrictions that cripple PSI’s ability to carry out its charitable efforts.  In particular, the 2017 Modified Advisory Opinion imposes new restrictions that prevent PSI from communicating with donors, potential donors or their purported “affiliates” about new or modified programs to treat chronic diseases affecting indigent populations.

Cutting out the legal jargon, the government is threatening PAP charities with prosecution to keep them from discussing the medical conditions they seek to combat with “donors” – who may also be manufacturers of products used to treat those conditions.  To operate, Patient Services must have an OIG advisory opinion, which it did through 2014.   Then, according to the complaint, OIG changed the rules.  “OIG specifically required [plaintiff] to make a series of certifications to retain an advisory opinion.”  Complaint ¶81.  In order to keep operating, the plaintiff accepted the certifications (nearly “two dozen” of them), and in the litigation, challenged them on First Amendment grounds.  Id. ¶¶82-84.

If, instead of charities and mandatory OIG “certifications,” we were to substitute FDA regulated manufacturers and CIAs involving off-label promotion restrictions, it would be the same situation we warned about previously.  That’s why the Patient Services interests us.

In a recent brief in Patient Services, OIG now argues that, regardless of what the First Amendment may or may not protect, the plaintiff waived its First Amendment rights when it agreed – under threat of prosecution − to the certifications.  Deleting as many case-specific facts as possible, OIG’s argument goes:

[T]his case . . . involves a negotiated waiver of First Amendment rights. . . .  In Lake James [Community Volunteer Fire Dept., Inc. v. Burke County, N.C., 149 F.3d 277, 280 (4th Cir. 1998)], . . . a fire department’s “agreement to consent to citizens’ petitions and not to challenge them in court [wa]s [an] enforceable” waiver of its First Amendment rights.  Id.  Notably, the court applied this standard notwithstanding the fire department’s argument that it had been put to the choice between agreeing to a contract that included what it perceived to be unconstitutional provisions and going without the contract and the benefits it provided. . . .  Because the case ultimately involved a negotiated waiver of constitutional rights, the court applied the test, described below, to determine the enforceability of that waiver.

Just so here. [Plaintiff] agreed to the three provisions about which it now complains, i.e., to the extent these provisions affect [its] rights, it is because [plaintiff] waived those rights. . . .  Indeed, the negotiations were conducted by the Agency and counsel for [plaintiffs]. . . .

Under Lake James, a negotiated waiver of First Amendment rights is valid if it (1) is a “knowing waiver,” that is (2) “voluntarily given,” (3) and which does “not undermine the relevant public interest.”  149 F.3d at 280.  . . . Judicially noticeable facts and facts included in the administrative record – namely, the size and sophistication of [plaintiff] . . ., the fact that it was assisted by counsel, and the fact that negotiations stretched on for years – indicate that any waiver of First Amendment rights was both knowing and voluntary.

OIG brief at 9-11 (factual citations omitted) (emphasis added).

So there you have it.  Even if we win, and truthful off-label promotion is declared constitutionally protected from government interference, OIG is prepared to argue that existing CIAs – even though negotiated under threat of federal debarment – remain enforceable.  Almost all manufacturers with CIAs far exceed the charitable plaintiff in Patient Services in terms of “size and sophistication,” and all were “assisted by counsel” in the “negotiations” that produced CIAs in which they agreed to refrain from all off-label promotion, including truthful promotion.  So, even though those CIAs were about as voluntary as breathing, expect the OIG to argue otherwise, because it is arguing just that, right now.

Amarin was smart when it insisted on a First Amendment non-waiver provision when it settled with the government.  Of course, it also had a more favorable negotiating position, having won a First Amendment decision that the government was loathe to appeal.  Anyone subject to a CIA who doesn’t have such a provision, however, must be prepared to fight a second front, against OIG, even after Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc., 564 U.S. 552 (2011), is applied to truthful off-label promotion on a nationwide basis.

Be prepared – and watch what happens with constitutional waiver in the Patient Services case.

Researchers at Temple University here in Philly recently published a scientific article, “Learning Impairments, Memory Deficits, and Neuropathology in Aged Tau Transgenic Mice Are Dependent on Leukotrienes Biosynthesis: Role of the cdk5 Kinase Pathway,” in the scientific journal Molecular Neurobiology.  That sounds pretty dense, but what the article concludes is that the generic drug zileuton (branded name Zyflo) has been shown – in a transgenic mouse study – to reduce both physical evidence of Alzheimer’s disease, and its mental symptoms.  To wit:

[A]ged tau transgenic mice were randomized to receive zileuton . . . starting at 12 months of age for 16 weeks and then assessed in their functional and pathological phenotype.  Compared with baseline, we observed that untreated tau mice had a worsening of their memory and spatial learning.  By contrast, tau mice treated with zileuton had a reversal of these deficits and behaved in an undistinguishable manner from wild-type mice.

“Learning Impairments” Article, at Abstract (emphasis added).  In lay terms, it might just successfully treat (we hesitate to throw the “c” word around) Alzheimer’s disease.

Nothing else works very well at treating Alzheimer’s disease.

Zileuton/Zyflo has been on the market since 1996, indicated for treatment of asthma, and is thus available for generic production under Hatch-Waxman.

Since this drug has already been FDA approved, it may also be used off-label, right now, to treat Alzheimer’s patients under the therapeutic rationale explained in the “Learning Impairments” article.  With the drug’s basic safety profile already established by FDA approval and twenty-something years of clinical use, the primary issue in any such off-label use is effectiveness – does it actually benefit Alzheimer’s patients – rather than safety.

Let’s assume, for the moment, that zileuton/Zyflo actually has therapeutic value for treating Alzheimer’s in humans.  This is a drug that can be produced generically, so who is going to finance the Phase III human studies necessary to provide the “substantial evidence” that the FDA requires for a label change adding a new indication?  If any generic manufacturer can take a “free ride” on studies sponsored – at great expense – by someone else, then there is not much incentive for anyone to spend that money.  Thus, this extremely consequential new indication may become a regulatory orphan.  Of course, if the drug shows sufficient promise, other sources of funding could become available – third party payers who pay for the medical needs of Alzheimer’s patients, or even the research fund that is supported by the recently issued Alzheimer’s semipostal stamp.

If this off-label use is truly beneficial, then it would (in the absence of any better treatment option) likely become the medical standard of care despite being off-label.  Eventually, the FDA would be forced to engage in some ad hoc, retrospective approach in order to reconcile the label with clinical practice.  That’s how the FDA finally resolved the regulatory conundrum of so-called “pedicle screws,” where regulation fell behind clinical practice – a retrospective study supported the safety and effectiveness of off-label spinal use, but only after manufacturers endured a decade of meritless product liability litigation.  See 63 Fed. Reg. 40025-41 (FDA Jul. 27, 1998).

While further studies are being performed, however, what happens to scientific communication?  This could be (or it could not be – too early to tell for sure) an historic breakthrough in treatment of Alzheimer’s.  If it is, does the FDA continue to prohibit any manufacturer of zileuton/Zyflo from informing the medical community of information on the effectiveness of the off-label treatment, such as optimal dosage and administration practices?  We’ve frequently decried the unconstitutionality of such speaker- and topic-based restrictions on manufacturer scientific communications under the First Amendment.  However, for the most part the FDA’s refusal to conform to current First Amendment norms has flown under the public’s radar, allowing the agency to get away with dilatoriness, and the rest of the government to monetize the FDA’s unconstitutional stance with through “false” claims litigation that isn’t really about falsity.

Alzheimer’s, however, is the elephant in the room.  Without some sort of effective treatment, our health care system cannot indefinitely support the cost of palliative Alzheimer’s care.  Almost everybody knows somebody suffering from dementia, or else someone suffering through the heartbreak of caring for someone with dementia.  The FDA will run into a political and medical buzz saw if its retrograde attitude towards truthful off-label promotion gets in the way of making information about an effective (we hope) treatment for Alzheimer’s available to the public.

And now – but probably not coincidentally – it looks like the FDA is finally getting off the regulatory schneid.  A couple of days ago, the agency issued a “statement” from the commissioner about what was billed as a “new effort” “to advance medical product communications to support drug competition and value-based health care.”  The big news in the statement is rather buried in regulatory-speak, but it is legitimate big news:

Additionally, it’s our [FDA’s] belief that giving companies clear guidelines for providing payors with truthful and non-misleading information about unapproved products and unapproved uses of approved or cleared products will help facilitate communications that can allow payors to provide coverage for these new products and new uses more quickly after FDA approval or clearance.  And our hope is that these communications can also help companies and payors establish pricing structures that benefit patients as well as health plans.

(Emphasis added).  That’s a reference to (among other things) off-label use.  Specifically, the FDA is now approving “truthful and non-misleading” off-label promotion when directed to an audience of third party payors.

The details of this regulatory retreat from Moscow are found in the FDA’s new final guidance, “Drug and Device Manufacturer Communications With Payors, Formulary Committees, & Similar Entities − Questions & Answers, available here.  That’s another mouthful, so we’ll call it the “Off-Label Promotion (OLP) Guidance,” since that’s really what it is.

The FDA is now allowing those who market prescription drugs and medical devices (see id. at 16 explaining the identical treatment of all classes of medical devices) to provide information about off-label uses of these products to “payors, formulary committees, or other similar entities with knowledge and expertise in the area of health care economic analysis.”  OLP Guidance at 1 (footnote omitted)

This audience includes public and private sector payors, formulary committees (e.g., pharmacy and therapeutics committees), drug information centers, technology assessment committees, pharmacy benefit managers, third party administrators, and other multidisciplinary entities that, on behalf of health care organizations, review scientific and/or technology assessments to make drug or device selection or acquisition, formulary management, and/or coverage and reimbursement decisions on a population basis.

OLP Guidance at 5 (footnotes omitted).

That’s the who.

The “what” is just about everything.  The kind of information that regulated drug and device manufacturers can now provide to third-party payors about off-label uses is defined as:

“any analysis (including the clinical data, inputs, clinical or other assumptions, methods, results, and other components underlying or comprising the analysis) that identifies, measures, or describes the economic consequences, which may be based on the separate or aggregated clinical consequences of the represented health outcomes, of the use of a drug.  Such analysis may be comparative to the use of another drug, to another health care intervention, or to no intervention. . . .  [Off-label promotion] may include comparative analyses of the economic consequences of a drug’s clinical outcomes to alternative options (including the use of another drug) or to no intervention.

[The information] can be presented in a variety of ways that can include, but are not limited to, an evidence dossier, a reprint of a publication from a peer-reviewed journal, a software package comprising a model with a user manual, a budget-impact model, a slide presentation, or a payor brochure.

OLP Guidance at 4-5.

The “when” varies a bit depending on whether what kind of off-label use is at issue.  The FDA has drawn what we believe to be a new distinction between “material differences” from the labeling that “relate[] to an approved indication” and so-called “unapproved indications.”  Id. at 7.  In our experience, the FDA has always considered any variance from labeling limitations to be off-label use.  But now, as to approved indications, “material differences from the FDA-approved labeling (e.g., new or increased risks, different dosing/use regimens, different endpoints, more-limited/targeted patient populations)” are treated differently, and somewhat less stringently.  Id. at 6.  A presentation “should include an accurate overview of the design of the economic analysis, including a statement of the study objectives.”  Id. at 11 (going into considerable detail).

As to promotion of uses involving such “material differences” from labeling, a basis in “competent and reliable scientific evidence” is sufficient.  Id. at 10.  In determining the sufficiency of the scientific basis, the FDA will be deferring to “existing current good research practices for substantiation developed by authoritative bodies.”  Id.  The prior FDA requirements of “substantial evidence” is nowhere mentioned.  It appears to be gone as a restriction on off-label promotion under the OLP Guidance.  Promotion of “material differences” must include a “conspicuous and prominent statement describing” those differences.  Id. at 14.

However, off-label promotion “regarding unapproved products and unapproved uses of approved/cleared products” is also now allowed by the FDA.  Id. at 18-20.  As to this type of what might be considered “true” off-label uses, distribution of the following information to third-party payers is now OK with the FDA:

  • “Product information (e.g., drug class, device description and features).”
  • “Information about the indication(s) sought, such as information from the clinical study protocol(s) about endpoint(s) being studied and the patient population under investigation (e.g., number of subjects enrolled, subject enrollment criteria, subject demographics).”
  • “Anticipated timeline for possible FDA approval/clearance/licensure of the product or of the new use.”
  • “Product pricing information.”
  • “Patient utilization projections (e.g., epidemiological data projection on incidence and prevalence).”
  • “Product-related programs or services (e.g., patient support programs).”
  • “Factual presentations of results from studies, including clinical studies of drugs or devices or bench tests that describe device performance (i.e., no characterizations or conclusions should be made regarding the safety or effectiveness of the unapproved product or the unapproved use).”

Id. at 18-19.

This kind of off-label promotion should be accompanied by a variety of disclaimers and other information to ensure that the off-label nature of the uses involved is understood:

  • “A clear statement that the product or use is not approved/cleared/licensed, and that the safety or effectiveness of the product or use has not been established.”
  • “Information related to the stage of product development” and “whether a marketing application for the product or new use has been submitted to FDA or when such a submission is planned.”
  • “[M]aterial aspects of study design and methodology and . . . material limitations related to the study design, methodology, and results. Firms should also ensure that results are not selectively presented.”
  • “A prominent statement disclosing the indication(s) for which FDA has approved, cleared, or licensed the product and a copy of the most current FDA-required labeling.”

Id. at 19.  Significantly, there is no prerequisite that an FDA application for marketing be either pending or contemplated, although if this is the case, it should be disclosed.

As to off-label promotion of these so-called “unapproved uses” (and also drugs and devices that have not yet received any FDA regulatory OK), the FDA tries to salvage what it can of the justifications it used to advance in opposition to our side’s First Amendment arguments about truthful off-label promotion:

FDA believes that the categories of information . . . are, on the one hand, broad enough to encompass the information that payors may need to make informed coverage and reimbursement decisions and, on the other hand, limited enough to maintain appropriate incentives for firms to conduct robust studies to evaluate the safety and efficacy of unapproved products and unapproved uses of approved/cleared/licensed medical products. . . .  FDA believes that the risk that payors will be misled is relatively low.  Payors are a sophisticated audience with established procedures to carefully consider the full range of relevant evidence about new uses of medical products.

OLP Guidance 21-22.

Finally, the OLP Guidance reminds us that “[f]irms’ communications to other audiences about unapproved products or unapproved uses of approved/cleared/licensed products could raise additional or different considerations and are beyond the scope of this guidance.” Id. at 22.

In conclusion, let’s look at that last point a bit. The OLP Guidance punches another huge hole in the FDA’s previous attempts to ban regulated entities from distributing truthful information about off-label uses to anybody.  As discussed at some length in Greater New Orleans Broadcasting Ass’n, Inc. v. United States, 527 U.S. 173, 192-94 (1999), the number and nature of exceptions to a speech prohibition adversely affect both the prohibition’s rationality and its ability to advance the governmental interest that motivates it.  We fail to see how any constitutionally valid distinction can exist between providing the identical information, with identical disclaimers and limitations, to one “sophisticated” audience (third-party payors) while prohibiting that information’s distribution to another “sophisticated” audience – that being medical doctors that directly prescribe these drugs and devices.

And that’s just within the rubric of commercial speech.  Greater New Orleans also cautioned, “decisions that select among speakers conveying virtually identical messages are in serious tension with the principles undergirding the First Amendment.”  Id. at 194.  We now have Sorrell v. IMS Health, Inc., 564 U.S. 552 (2011), for the proposition that, with respect to pharmaceutical detailing, we’re not just dealing with commercial speech.

Thus, we believe that, as a practical matter, the OLP Guidance effectively dooms any First Amendment defensibility of an FDA ban on the same truthful information being distributed, in the same fashion, to the rest of the medical community beyond third-party payors.  Conversely, to those regulated entities that seek to inform physicians of truthful scientific information about their products, we believe that the OLP Guidance can serve as a roadmap to success in an Amarin Pharma, Inc. v. FDA, 119 F. Supp.3d 196 (S.D.N.Y. 2015), situation by establishing that off-label promotion is “truthful,” “not misleading,” and therefore protected against governmental enforcement activity.  After all, just as third-party payers are sophisticated professionals interested in possible effective treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, so are the doctors directly involved in treating Alzheimer’s patients.

This post is from the non-Reed Smith side of the blog.

We’ve posted on two other occasions about the Shuker v. Smith & Nephew case as the Eastern District of Pennsylvania systematically dismantled the case on the grounds of preemption and pleading deficiencies. You can find those posts here and here. Unfortunately, the recent Third Circuit opinion deciding plaintiff’s appeal isn’t the full affirmance we had been hoping for. But before you get the wrong idea, the Third Circuit got the most important issue right – when you have a multi-component medical device, PMA preemption is to be addressed on a component-by-component basis. After that, however, the appellate decision does some unraveling of the district’s dismissal of the claims that survived preemption and so the case is going back to the Eastern District.

Briefly, the facts are that plaintiff underwent a hip replacement surgery in which his surgeon opted to use a Smith & Nephew device that consisted of several component parts, one of which was the R3 metal liner. Shuker v. Smith & Nephew, PLC, 2018 U.S. App. LEXIS 5160, *11 (3d Cir. Mar. 1, 2018). Unlike the other components of the device, the liner had undergone FDA Pre-Market approval. Id. And, the parties are in agreement that the surgeon’s decision to use the R3 metal liner with this particular device was an off-label use. Id. at *12. Plaintiff suffered complications that required additional revision surgeries.

In its first decision, the district court tossed out almost all claims as preempted and any non-preempted claims for being inadequately pleaded. When plaintiff filed an amended complaint attempting to correct the pleading deficiencies for the non-preempted claims, he again missed the mark and his remaining claims were dismissed with prejudice. The district court also entered a decision finding that it lacked personal jurisdiction over Smith & Nephew, PLC – a foreign parent company. Those three rulings are what the Third Circuit addressed in last week’s decision.

The question of how to apply PMA-preemption to a multi-component device was one of first impression in the Courts of Appeal. Id. at *2. And it is an important question because surgeons engaging in off-label use do mix and match parts with different regulatory backgrounds. The Third Circuit did a precise analysis that landed at the proper conclusion. However, the analysis does start up with a bit of a hiccup. Since we are talking about PMA-preemption, we are dealing with express preemption. Yet, in a footnote the court refused to follow the Supreme Court’s recent abolition of the presumption against preemption in the express preemption context set forth in Puerto Rico v. Franklin Cal. Tax-Free Tr., 136 S.Ct. 1938 (2016), because that decision wasn’t a products liability case and therefore did not directly concern the “historic police powers of the States.” Shuker, at *16n.9. We respectfully disagree with this conclusion for all the reasons we mention in our post discussing Franklin and simply point out that other courts have reached the opposite conclusion. Accord Watson v. Air Methods Corp., 870 F.3d 812, 817 (8th Cir. 2017) (following Franklin and rejecting presumption against preemption in express preemption case); EagleMed LLC v. Cox, 868 F.3d 893, 903, (10th Cir. 2017) (same); Atay v. Cty. of Maui, 842 F.3d 688, 699 (9th Cir. 2016) (same); Conklin v. Medtronic, Inc., ___ P.3d ___, 2017 WL 4682107, at *2 (Ariz. App. Oct. 19, 2017) (under Franklin courts may not invoke a presumption against preemption in PMA preemption cases); Olmstead v. Bayer Corp., 2017 WL 3498696, at *3 n.2 (N.D.N.Y. Aug. 15, 2017) (plaintiff’s assertion of presumption against preemption in PMA preemption case held “frivolous” after Franklin).

Fortunately, that did not derail the Third Circuit from ultimately concluding that plaintiff’s negligence, strict liability, and breach of implied warranty claims were all preempted under Riegel. To do that, the court had to determine to what device it was applying the preemption analysis. Plaintiff argued that you have to look at the device that was implanted as a whole. Whereas defendant, bolstered by an amicus brief filed by the FDA at the court’s request, maintained that the proper focus is on the component of the device with which plaintiff takes issue. Shuker, at *18. Agreeing with the defense position, the court anchored its decision on three findings. First, the FDCA defines “device” to include “components, parts, and accessories.” Id. at *19. Second, the FDCA’s off-label provisions specifically acknowledge that a physician can and will use components separately from the system for which the FDA approved use. Id. at *20. And despite the use to which the component is put, the FDA’s PMA-regulations for the component follow with it. In other words, “premarket approval requirements apply equally to the components, as manufacturers generally may not deviate from the requirements imposed through premarket approval regardless of how [a component] is used.” Id. (citation and quotation marks omitted). Third, the FDA’s position is that the device is not limited to the device as a whole but includes components. Further, the FDA is charged with assuring the safety and effectiveness of components as well as finished devices. Id. at *21-22.

Therefore,

[t]aken together, the statutory definition of “device,” the treatment of off-label uses, and the guidance of the FDA all counsel in favor of scrutinizing hybrid systems at the component-level. . . .. And the Riegel test is properly framed at Step One as “whether the Federal Government has established requirements applicable” to a component of the hybrid system.

Id. at *22-23. Because the part of the device plaintiff attacked was the R3 metal liner which was premarket-approved, any state tort claim that seeks to impose requirements that are different from or in addition to the FDA’s requirements for that component are preempted. That includes plaintiff’s negligence, strict liability, and implied warranty claims.

The appellate court next reviewed the dismissal of plaintiff’s claims that survived preemption – negligence and fraud claims based on alleged off-label promotion in violation of federal law – and found the negligence claim was adequately pleaded but that plaintiff failed again to satisfy Rule 9’s heightened standard for pleading fraud. As to negligence, the court found TwIqbal satisfied as to duty, breach, causation where plaintiff alleged:

  • the R3 metal liner was approved only for use with a different system and therefore under federal law defendant had a duty to refrain from false or misleading advertising;
  • in a press release, defendant misleadingly marketed the R3 metal liner as an option for the system used by plaintiff’s surgeon (one other than the one it was approved for); and
  • plaintiff’s surgeon “either read” or “was aware” of the press release.

Id. at *28-29. Like the district court, the Third Circuit considered and relied upon the press release cited in plaintiff’s complaint. Unlike the district court, the Third Circuit appears to only focus on the portions of the press release upon which plaintiff relied (see prior post for more details) and concludes that’s enough to get plaintiff to the discovery stage. Id. at *29n.18. Although we wonder if the court’s calling plaintiff’s allegations enough to “nudge” the claim over the threshold is a veiled acknowledgement of just how narrowly the complaint squeaked by. See id. at *30.

Meanwhile, plaintiff’s fraud claim needed more than a nudge and it didn’t get even that. The court focused on plaintiff’s failure to plead justifiable reliance on the alleged misrepresentation. The “read” or “was aware” of allegation that sufficed for negligence lacked the requisite details regarding how the press release “induced or influenced” plaintiff’s surgeon for a fraud claim. Id. at *33-34. Plaintiff has to allege the “circumstances of the alleged [influence on Mr. Shuker’s surgeon] with sufficient particularity to place [defendant] on notice of the precise misconduct with which it is charged.” Id. at *34. Despite this having been plaintiff’s second failed attempt at meeting the pleading standard on fraud, the Third Circuit decided to give plaintiff another chance and found the claim should only be dismissed without prejudice.

Finally, there was a separate finding by the district court that it did not have personal jurisdiction over Smith & Nephew, PLC, a foreign parent company. The Third Circuit agreed with the district court that specific personal jurisdiction was not conferred on a stream-of-commerce theory. Id. at *36-37. We’ve talked about this before and more recently in light of BMS v. Superior Court, and like the Third Circuit “we have no cause to revisit” the precedent on the issue (but you should feel free to). But the court did think plaintiff alleged enough in his complaint to allow some limited jurisdictional discovery on possible alter ego based personal jurisdiction. Id. at *38-40. Emphasis on the limited part. See id. at *40n.20 (“District Court should take care to circumscribe the scope of discovery . . . to only the factual questions necessary to determine its jurisdiction;” further referencing proportionality amendment to Rule 26(b)(1)).

So, on the third pass plaintiff got a little life breathed back into this case which is unfortunate, but as the first appellate decision on component preemption – we’ll put it in the win column.

Perhaps you have heard that elections have consequences. That is true not only for high-profile issues that hog the headlines on CNN and Fox News, but it is also true for drug and device litigation regulation. Such drug and device regulation can be just as important, if not considerably more important, than whatever current political claptrap is getting all the bandwidth.  Drug and device availability and innovation actually affects people’s lives regularly and profoundly. Despite the typical claims of plaintiff lawyers at trial, the FDA is not a paper tiger.  The FDA’s actions and attitudes have a huge impact on the industry.  Those attitudes and actions can oscillate with election results. For example, in 2016, the FDA issued 15 warning letters to drug and device manufacturers regarding alleged false or misleading advertising. 2017 saw only three such warning letters and one untitled letter.  Change is in the air.  We did not see any coverage this weekend of the FDA’s January 12, 2018 statement “on FDA decision to seek additional time to reassess rule that would have changed longstanding practices for how the agency determined the ‘intended use’ of medical products.”  Take a look at the FDA’s announcement here:  https://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm592358.htm.  If you are a completist, here is the full proposal of delay from the Federal Register:  https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2018/01/16/2018-00555/clarification-of-when-products-made-or-derived-from-tobacco-are-regulated-as-drugs-devices-or.  Whatever else you might think about the Trump vs. Obama administrations, this rethink is an example of the new FDA leadership doing the right thing.

The background is a bit byzantine.  In the waning days of the Obama administration, on January 9, 2017, the FDA issued a Final Rule on “Clarification of When Products Made or Derived from Tobacco are Regulated as Drugs, Devices, or Combination Products; Amendments to Regulations Regarding ‘Intended Uses.’” That “clarification” was both a trick and a double-cross.  The tobacco features were a distraction from the FDA’s desperate attempt to save its constitutionally-suspect enterprise of clamping down on communications about off-label use of drugs or devices.  As we have described several times before, the FDA’s power to punish off-label promotion rests on a regulatory two-step, whereby off-label promotions are said to prove an indicated use not included in the label and, thus, not accompanied by adequate directions for use – making the product misbranded. Got that? The regulations supporting this tortured logic have been around since the 1950s, but a recent series of court decisions invoking the First Amendment called into question the FDA’s interpretation of “intended use” and its efforts to shut down truthful medical-science communications about potential benefits from off-label use.  In a 2015 proposed rule, the FDA proposed striking the language from the regulations permitting the FDA to consider a manufacturer’s mere knowledge of actual use as evidence of intended use. Good news, right? We thought so.  But not so fast. The FDA’s January 9, 2017 proposal reversed course, retained knowledge of off-label use as evidence of intended use, clarified that any relevant source of evidence, whether circumstantial or direct could demonstrate intended use, and ultimately invoked the dreaded “totality of the evidence” standard.  A constitutionally frail regulatory regime looked like it was about to become even worse – even more vague, over broad, and chilling.

We bemoaned this ugly turn of events, as did many other legal commentators.  Not to take undue credit, but we suspect that the eruption of the legal blogosphere on this issue had a beneficial result.  The incoming Trump administration placed a brief hold on new regulations, and then delayed the “intended use” regulation to March 19, 2018 so that comments could be received and considered.  Did comments pour in?  Yes they did.  Fifteen comments came in.  Two addressed the tobacco issues.  (That portion of the regulation will go forward.)  Thirteen criticized the new broadening of the types of evidence that could be considered in determining intended use.  One of those comments was written by PhRMA.  We summarized that excellent, persuasive comment here.  Read as a whole (or, if you prefer, the totality of the circumstances), the comments made a strong case that the proposed final rule violated the First Amendment, was so vague as to implicate due process, interfered with the practice of medicine, departed from existing statutes, cases, regulations, and past practices, and would have negative health implications.  You all spoke up, and the FDA listened. The bottom line is that the FDA is now proposing to “delay until further notice” the portions of the final rule amending the FDA’s existing regulations describing the types of evidence that may be considered in determining a medical product’s intended uses.  The FDA will receive comments on this proposal through February 5, 2018.  If you haven’t spoken up on this very important issue, speak up now.  How many times in your life and career can you take a position that actually makes a difference, and that both saves lives and free speech?

We sometimes spend time on this blog grousing.  Not this time.  Well done, FDA. Well done, all of you who contributed to the debate.

With PLIVA, Inc. v. Mensing, 564 U.S. 604 (2011), and Mutual Pharmaceutical Co. v. Bartlett, 133 S. Ct. 2466 (2013), preemption arguments in cases involving generic prescription drugs has become a little like shooting fish in a barrel, as our generic preemption scorecard documents.  Still, that’s no reason not to praise good results.  Recently, the manufacturers of generic amiodarone scored two big wins on the same day.  Moore v. Zydus Pharmaceuticals (USA), Inc., ___ F. Supp.3d ___, 2017 WL 4365162 (E.D. Ky. Sept. 29, 2017); Bean v. Upsher-Smith Pharmaceuticals, Inc., 2017 WL 4348330 (D.S.C. Sept. 29, 2017).  Moore, which is headed for F. Supp. publication, is the more comprehensive case, so we’ll start with it.

The plaintiffs’ pitch, such as it is, in these cases is that the generic defendants either piggybacked on the branded manufacturer’s earlier off-label promotion or else engaged in such promotion themselves.  Secondarily, they claim that they didn’t receive the medication guide that the FDA requires manufacturers of this product to provide to prescribing physicians.  Somehow, the failure of the prescriber to pass along this pamphlet is the manufacturer’s fault.

Didn’t work (mostly) in Moore.  As for the off-label promotion allegations, they were barred – as other information-related claims involving generic products are barred – because “the generic drug manufacturer could not change its labeling without violating FDA regulations.”  Moore, 2017 WL 4365162, at *3 (citing Mensing).  Further, the entire concept of “off-label” is derived from the FDA-approved label, and thus from the Food, Drug & Cosmetic Act (“FDCA”).  Id. at*7.  Plaintiff’s attempt to gin up a state-law negligence claim based on this alleged conduct ran straight into a quirk of Kentucky law that we’ve blogged about before:  Kentucky, by statute, prohibits negligence per se claims based on violations of federal law.

The Kentucky Supreme Court’s holding in T & M Jewelry, Inc. v. Hicks ex rel. Hicks, 189 S.W.3d 526, 530 (Ky. 2006) offers binding and unequivocal precedent concerning the scope of KRS 446.070 and demonstrates that [plaintiff] does not have a state based right to sue for negligence in this matter.

*          *          *          *

Under Kentucky law and the Kentucky Supreme Court’s analysis of KRS 446.070, which codifies the doctrine of negligence per se, . . . the statute “did not intend for KRS 446.070 to … confer a private civil remedy for” violations of federal law.

Moore, 2017 WL 4365162, at *7-8.  Aside from the off-label aspect, all warning claims were preempted under Mensing.  Id. at *8-9.  Plaintiff did not allege design- or manufacturing-related claims.  Id. at *8.

As for the purported failure to supply the FDA-mandated medication guide, that was something that the plaintiff simply made up.  Kentucky, like every other state, follows the learned intermediary rule.  Id. at *6.  The manufacturer thus has no obligation, “non-delegable” or otherwise, to communicate warnings directly to a patient who has been prescribed a drug.  Id.  Because there is no such state-law duty, any obligation to supply medication guides was imposed solely by the FDCA.  The FDCA, however, “leaves no doubt that it is the Federal Government rather than private litigants who are authorized to file suit for noncompliance.”  Id. at *5 (quoting Buckman Co. v. Plaintiffs Legal Committee, 531 U.S. 341, 349 n.4 (2001)).

Since [plaintiff’s] claim concerning receipt of the medication guide exists exclusively due to the federal regulatory scheme, her claim must fail as the cause of action is merely based upon alleged violation of the FDCA and it is the FDA, not [plaintiff], that “has at its disposal a variety of enforcement options that allow it to make a measured response to suspected fraud upon the Administration.”

Id. (again quoting Buckman, 531 U.S. at 349).

Implied warranty claims were preempted for the same reasons as negligence and strict liability claims.  Id. at *9.  Express warranty claims failed because there was nothing the “explicitly warranted” the drug’s safety for the off-label use in question.  Id. at *10.  Without any express language, the warranty claim was simply a doomed repackaging of plaintiff’s preempted warning claim.  Id. at *11.

The only claim that could conceivably survive preemption in Moore was a fraud claim based on false off-label promotion.  As we’ve seen numerous times in PMA preemption, while every other aspect of off-label promotion was protected by preemption, an allegation that was both false and an FDCA violation could survive – if a plaintiff ever properly pleaded it.  The plaintiff in Moore didn’t come close:

The majority of the complaint fails to specify actions undertaken by [defendant] and instead conflates accusations of wrongdoing against the two originally named “Defendants.”  Instead of providing specific details concerning when the wrongful conduct took place, the Complaint alleges that the “Defendants’ scheme in the past involved and continues to involve a calculated and deceitful sales campaign. . . .”

Id. at 12.  The complaint was such a mess that “it is unclear whether providing [plaintiff] with an opportunity to amend her complaint would be futile.”  Id.  The court decided to give her one more shot.  Id.

The second preemption win, Bean, 2017 WL 4348330, was mostly along the same lines, except that, being from South Carolina, the Kentucky quirk on negligence per se wasn’t at issue.  The plaintiff made same the allegations about off-label promotion and medication guides.  Id. at *1-4.  The court was even firmer about preemption, not allowing any loophole for “fraudulent” off-label promotion:

Plaintiff’s “off-label” promotion claims are due to be dismissed as preempted under Mensing and Bartlett. . . .   The basis for Plaintiff’s “off-label” marketing claim is that Defendants, by virtue of their marketing of [the drug off-label], rendered the manufacturer’s warning inadequate.  Defendants are prohibited by the FDCA and FDA regulations from adding or strengthening any warnings for [the drug] to address any risks associated with off-label use.  If successful, Plaintiff’s “off-label” promotion claims would necessarily require Defendants to either: 1) change the warning label or disseminate additional warnings to reflect the alleged additional dangers associated with the “off-label” use of amiodarone for atrial fibrillation; 2) accept state tort liability; or 3) exit the market place. . . .  [S]uch a result requires preemption under Mensing and Bartlett.  Plaintiff’s “off-label” promotion claims, whether sounding in fraud or negligence, are preempted by the FDCA.

Id. at *5.

Also, as in Moore, the medication guide allegations were preempted as private FDCA enforcement under Buckman.  2017 WL 4348330, at *6-7.  Plaintiff didn’t even respond to Buckman, which the court found particularly “telling. Id.; see id. at *7 (“the requirement to provide a Medication Guide to distributors is based solely in the requirements of the FDCA and related regulations”).  The learned intermediary rule, which South Carolina follows, precluded any state-law liability for failing to provide warnings directly to a patient . Id. at *8.  Buckman also did in the off-label promotion claims, because the court found no state-law obligation to avoid off-label promotion.  “[T]he duties Plaintiff alleges Defendants breached regarding ‘off-label’ promotion exist solely under the FDCA.”  Id. at *7.

The court in Bean was particularly unhappy with both plaintiffs’ allegations and with her counsel.  The allegations were inherently inconsistent, because by alleging that the medication guide contained “adequate and sufficient” warnings, the plaintiff necessarily defeated her own allegations.  “Plaintiff does not allege that the prescribing physician did not receive the Medication Guide, was unaware of its contents, or the risk [the guide discussed].”  Id. at *8.  These allegations weren’t “plausible on [their] face” under TwIqbal, because the prescriber received “adequate” warnings.  Id.  As for counsel:

Plaintiff’s failure to respond to the learned intermediary argument is striking because Plaintiff’s counsel has been involved in several other amiodarone cases that were dismissed in part pursuant to the learned intermediary doctrine.

Id. at *7 n.4 (string citation omitted).  Thus, the plaintiff in Bean, unlike the plaintiff in Moore, didn’t deserve – and didn’t get – any chance  to replead.  Id. at *8.

One thing that Moore and Bean exemplify to us is how preemption principles cut across product lines.  As we’ve chronicled, much of the favorable law as to off-label promotion was developed in the context of PMA preemption.  Buckman, of course, was an implied preemption case involving a 510(k) medical device.  Both Moore and Bean employed this precedent to dismiss claims involving generic drugs.  In view of this cross-pollination of defense arguments in preemption cases, we offer one final opportunity for improvement.  As we blogged about at length here, there is an additional Mensing/Bartlett preemption argument whenever off-label warning claims are asserted.  Only the FDA can require warnings about off-label uses.

A specific warning relating to a use not provided for under the “Indications and Usage” section may be required by FDA in accordance with sections 201(n) and 502(a) of the act if the drug is commonly prescribed for a disease or condition and such usage is associated with a clinically significant risk or hazard.

21 C.F.R. §201.57(c)(6)(i) (emphasis added).  See also 21 C.F.R. §201.80(e).   Thus, regardless of anything else, a manufacturer cannot add or alter warnings related to off-label uses without first getting the go ahead from the FDA.  In and of itself, that requires preemption of off-label warning claims under Mensing/Bartlett.  For more details, see the other post.

A defense win anywhere helps defendants everywhere.  Keep winning.

Implied Preemption.  Off-label promotion. TwIqbal.  They make up a core of our posts, yet we never seem to tire of them.  Maybe our readers, especially interlopers from the other side of the v., tire of reading about them, but we can often find a wrinkle in a case that merits our huzzahs or inspires a rant.  Today’s case falls into the praiseworthy category, as the court dismissed a complaint predicated on violations of the FDCA in spite of sympathetic allegations that might have carried the day with some other courts. Markland v. Insys Therapeutics, Inc., — F. Supp. 3d –, 2017 WL 4102300 (M.D. Fla. Sept. 15, 2017), involved the alleged death of a patient as a result of respiratory distress from the defendant’s sublingual spray prescription painkiller drug, which she had started the day before.  Rather than offer the typical product liability claims under Florida law, perhaps because the labeling had extensive warnings on respiratory distress, plaintiff asserted only a claim for negligent marketing.  Calling it “negligent marketing” does not really identify what duty was allegedly breached, whether state law recognizes a claim for such a breach, and such a claim would be preempted.  The allegedly actionable conduct in Markland was promoting the drug for off-label use, like the chronic back pain of plaintiff’s decedent, as opposed to the approved indication for breakthrough pain with cancer.  While we do not know the merits, there were many allegations about off-label promotion, which seem to tie to the conduct at issue in well-publicized federal and state investigations.

Defendants moved to dismiss on various grounds, the most relevant of which (for our purposes) were that there was no claim under Florida law for this conduct and it would be impliedly preempted under Buckman anyway.  These had been hot topics recently in some Florida state and federal cases we have discussed, like Mink (here and here) and Wolicki-Gables, but those dealt with PMA devices and the additional issue of express preemption.  Here, with a prescription drug marketed under an NDA approval, there is no express preemption to navigate, but the plaintiff still had to walk a narrow path to state a claim that would not be impliedly preempted.  As we have said before, we think the appropriate order of analysis here would be the determine if there was a cognizable state law claim asserted and then determine if it was preempted, but the Markland court did not separate out its analysis.  It also did not weigh in on whether the allegations here were of truthful off-label promotion that might implicate First Amendment protection.  Instead, it assumed that the off-label promotion alleged violated the FDCA’s prohibition on misbranding.  2017 WL 4102300, *6 & n.4.

The court could take this approach because the plaintiff’s claim was so squarely focused on alleged violations of the FDCA.  Since Buckman, plaintiffs tend to be a bit cagier in making it look like their claims were not predicated on violations of the FDCA or fraud on the FDA.  The Markland plaintiff, however, labeled the defendant’s alleged conduct as violating the FDCA, “federal law,” and “requirements imposed by the FDA regarding the condition that this drug should be utilized to treat cancer patients with breakthrough cancer pain.” Id. at *9.  “Hence, [the claim], while framed in the language of negligence, appears to derive from [defendant’s] alleged off-label promotion of [the drug]” and “the very concepts of off-label use and off-label marketing are born out of the FDCA.” Id.   This was well phrased, as was the later statement that “it is only because of the existence of the FDCA’s restrictions on off-label marketing that Mr. Markland claims [defendant’s] actions were improper or otherwise violated a duty.” Id.

This is the recipe for implied preemption under Buckman.  It also means there is no negligence claim under Florida law, “which bars plaintiffs from using state negligence actions to seek recovery for FDCA violations.” Id. at 10 (citing negligence per se cases).  Of course, Buckman recognized that the FDCA does not provide for a private right of action, and preempts claims with FDCA violations as “critical element[s],” which should prevent such piggybacking.  So, plaintiff’s case was done and could not be revived by amending the complaint.  In other words, there was no need for a second and third strike before judgment could be entered.  This was so despite the Court’s expression of compassion:

The Court does not question for a moment the grievous nature of Carolyn Markland’s death, nor the deep sadness Mr. Markland must face on a daily basis as a result of his wife’s untimely passing. Nonetheless, the Court must act within the bounds of the law.

Id. at *11.  This a good lesson, especially for courts sitting in diversity, that the law should not be expanded to allow for recovery by sympathetic who cannot make their case under accepted tort theories.