Recent Blog Posts

AstraZeneca CEO Steps Down as Earnings Fall

Pharmaceutical Injury Attorney — Wed, 16 May 2012 22:40:00 GMT

David Brennan, CEO of AstraZeneca, is leaving his position following a dramatic drop in the company's performance. Investors have recently become discontent with the performance of the company. Earnings dropped 19 percent last quarter likely because some of their main products have lost patent protection. Some of the company's drugs that are losing patent protection are Seroquel, Nexium and Crestor. Proton Pump Inhibitors (PPIs) from various companies are losing patent protection, not just AstraZeneca.

PPIs are drugs that reduce acid in the stomach for those suffering from conditions such as ulcers and acid reflux disease. Some of these are prescribed while some are available over the counter. If you were injured by a PPI then you may have a claim against a company like AstraZeneca with the help of a pharmaceutical injury lawyer at our firm. Arnold & Itkin is committed to helping victims of dangerous drugs get compensated, so contact a dangerous drug lawyer from the firm today about your case.

New Research Says Pradaxa More Dangerous Than Warfarin

Pharmaceutical Injury Lawyer — Mon, 14 May 2012 22:31:00 GMT

Ongoing studies have been taking place to determine just how dangerous the drug Pradaxa is. Pradaxa is a drug that is prescribed to patients to treat blood clots and prevent strokes. Patients started reported serious bleeding problems such as coughing up blood and heavy menstrual bleeding in women, for example. These types of symptoms can even lead to death in some extreme cases. Many patients switched their medications from a drug called warfarin to dabigatran (brand name: Pradaxa), but now studies show that the alternative may be even more dangerous.

Some doctors believe a primary concern is that doctors are too quick to write these types of prescriptions. Any anticoagulation medication needs proper patient counseling and physician follow-up in order to ensure safety. If you were harmed by the dangerous drug Pradaxa then get help from a pharmaceutical injury lawyer at the firm. Arnold & Itkin will represent you in your drug injury case so that you get the compensation you deserve. Contact a dangerous drug lawyer from the firm today.

Depakote Makers Pay $1.6 Billion over Illegal Drug Marketing Practices

Medical Injury Attorney — Fri, 11 May 2012 22:00:00 GMT

Abbott Laboratories has agreed to pay $1.6 billion in fines to state and federal governments for illegally promoting unapproved uses of its anti-seizure drug Depakote. At specific issue was the promotion of Depakote as a sedative for elderly nursing home patients. As part of the settlement, Abbott also agreed to plead guilty to a criminal misdemeanor.

When the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gives approval for a drug, they also list the "safe and effective" purposes for which it can be used. While doctors are allowed to prescribe the medication for other uses (known as off-label prescribing) drug manufacturers cannot market the drugs for those off-label practices.

Tony West, acting associate attorney general says, "Not only did Abbott engage in off-label promotion, but it targeted elderly dementia patients and downplayed the risks apparent from its own clinical studies." Abbott admits that, beginning in 1998, it trained a sales group to promote Depakote to nursing-home employees as a way to control agitation and aggression in elderly dementia patients. The next year, Abbott had to discontinue a clinical trial testing the drug's effectiveness against dementia symptoms because they found that Depakote increased drowsiness, dehydration and anorexia in elderly patients. In spite of these findings, the sales team continued to promote the drug for use in nursing homes until 2006. One of Abbott's key marketing tactics was to promote the drug by informing staff that Depakote was not included in a 1987 law designed to prevent the use of unnecessary drugs in nursing care facilities.

Abbott also offered incentives to pharmacies that served long-term-care facilities, giving them rebates based on their ability to increase the use of Depakote in the homes they served. The company engaged in equally aggressive marketing practices to promote Depakote for the treatment of schizophrenia between 2001 and 2006. Two separate studies funded by Abbott showed that Depakote was ineffective as a booster for anti-psychotic drugs.

The illegal practices were brought to the government's attention by four company whistleblowers; they will split $84 million of the settlement money for their actions. The $1.6 billion payment is the second largest settlement over illegal drug marketing practices. The largest—$2.3 billion—was paid by Pfizer in 2009.

When pharmaceutical companies market drugs illegally, innocent patients like elderly nursing home residents are often the ones to suffer. If you or a loved one has been injured by a drug used for an unapproved treatment, you may be entitled to compensation and a medical injury attorney at the firm can help. Contact a medical injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.

Louisiana Attorney General gets $25.2 Million from Fraudulent Drug Companies

Personal Injury Attorney — Fri, 11 May 2012 21:55:00 GMT

Five pharmaceutical companies—Actavis, Boehringer Ingelheim, Dey, GlaxoSmithKline and Schering-Plough—will pay the state of Louisiana a combined $25.2 million for misreporting drug price information in order to receive larger reimbursements from the state Medicaid plan.

Medicaid reimburses drug suppliers based on cost calculations known as the "average wholesale price." Many drug companies, including the five held accountable in the Louisiana suit, falsely inflate their average wholesale prices in order to receive larger government payouts. Several other states are currently pursuing cases against companies engaged in this fraudulent practice.

Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell, who brought suit against the companies, said, "Fraudulent over-pricing and marketing of prescription drugs caused Louisiana taxpayers and the Medicaid program to grossly over-pay for those prescriptions. Pharmaceutical companies who do this will be held accountable."

Beginning in 2010, Caldwell filed suit against 18 different drug companies, alleging that some inflated average wholesale prices were as high as 6000% greater than the true cost of the drugs. Those cases have resulted in the payback of $138 million to the Louisiana Medicaid program. Caldwell hopes to push any remaining defendants to trial shortly in order to recover the maximum amount of funds possible.

Large pharmaceutical companies are frequently caught engaging in fraudulent practices in the pursuit of profits, regardless of the impact their actions have on the public. If you or a loved one has been injured by the negligent acts of a pharmaceutical company, you may be entitled to compensation and a pharmaceutical injury lawyer at the firm can help. Contact a personal injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.

West Virginia Trans-Vaginal MDL Running Smoothly

Pharmaceutical Injury Lawyer — Fri, 11 May 2012 20:30:00 GMT

According to recent reports, the U.S. District Court for the West Virginia transvaginal mesh MDL is underway and running smoothly. This case was consolidated in February of this year and includes four different transvaginal mesh manufacturers. This particular MDL is therefore made up of four smaller MDLs. The companies that are the defendants in this case are American Medical Systems, Boston Scientific, C.R. Bard and Ethicon/Gynecare. They are all on trial for distributing and manufacturing defective medical devices. The Food and Drug Administration issued an official warning regarding the negative side effects associated with this device in 2011.

These lawsuits are leaning even more in favor of the plaintiffs because of the fact that these devices were approved through the FDA's 510(k) process. This rule allows for products to reach the market that have not been tested on the basis that they are similar to products already on the market. Please speak with a pharmaceutical injury lawyer from Arnold & Itkin to learn how we can bring your case against the defective product manufacturer. Contact a dangerous medical device attorney from our firm today for more information.

Debate over FDA "Conditional Approval" of New Drugs

Medical Injury Attorney — Thu, 10 May 2012 21:50:00 GMT

Existing policies by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) allow "accelerated approval" of some developing drugs. "Accelerated approval" lets the FDA approve drugs in phase II of safety trials, as long as the drug manufacturer still conducts phase III trials. If, for some reason, the phase III trials don't work well, or new safety concerns pop up, the FDA can revoke approval. Now, a newly proposed "conditional approval," designed to approve more drugs after phase II testing, is raising debate in the industry and beyond.

In a report recently published by Avik Roy of the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, he advocates for "conditional approval," noting the fact that the high costs of phase III trials have discouraged drug makers from developing antidotes for conditions related to obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. His "conditional approval" plan would allow drugs that appear to be safe and promising during phase I and II tests to gain approval for limited patient marketing. This plan would, according to the author, give patients earlier access to potentially helpful drugs, allow the FDA to continue to collect safety information (revoking the drug's approval at a later date if needed) and offset some of the costs of developing a new drug.

Industry experts are responding to the proposal with concern, however. They say that, without conducting large-scale (expensive) phase III trials, it is impossible to know the true scale of a drug's risks, benefits and potential side effects. They also note the problems that may be caused if the FDA does have to revoke a drug's approval—how will the public react when they learn the FDA-approved drug they've been using is, in fact, unsafe?

Everyone can agree that the rising cost of prescription medications is problematic and needs to be fixed. Those fixes should not, however, come at the cost of public safety. If you or a loved one has been injured by a dangerous drug, you may be entitled to compensation and a drug defect attorney at the firm is able to help. Contact a medical injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.

FDA has no Monitoring System for Medical Devices

Personal Injury Attorney — Thu, 10 May 2012 21:50:00 GMT

Five years ago, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) received permission from Congress to set up a unique identifier system to monitor medical devices after they were approved for entry into the marketplace. To date, however, no such system has been implemented. Medical devices like hip implants and artificial pacemakers are placed in patients without any form of identification, so the FDA has no ability to track the number of devices being used in patients. Without this data, it is impossible to know how significant reported side effects may be.

In the past few years, widespread malfunctions of approved medical devices like the DePuy Hip Implant and, more recently, the St. Jude Riata leads, have shown that medical devices can cause as much damage to patients as dangerous drugs. In spite of this fact, the FDA only tracks prescription drugs, not medical devices. The agency instead depends on voluntary reports from manufacturers, hospitals, doctors and patients to learn of problems with medical devices.

The only time a problem with a medical device must be legally reported to the FDA is when manufacturers are notified by a doctor or hospital that someone has died or been seriously injured as a result of their product's malfunction. Even so, this obligation does not always lead to swift remedies—St. Jude's leads were only recalled months after the FDA received a physician's report alerting them to problems with the device. In the interim, tens of thousands of patients were implanted with Riata leads (the product, installed in defibrillators, has been show to malfunction when wires escape from insulation, leaving the patient with an irregular heartbeat. At least 22 deaths in the U.S. have been attributed to the dangerous medical device.)

The Senate agrees that there is severe risk involved in foregoing medical device monitoring. To combat this problem, they have proposed a bill that would institute a mandatory timeline for the implementation of medical device monitoring. The bill cleared the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee last week.

Without an appropriate monitoring system, it may take months or even years to remove dangerous medical devices from the market. In the meantime, unsuspecting patients continue to be implanted with these products. If you or a loved one has been injured by a dangerous medical device, you may be entitled to compensation and a drug defect attorney at the firm can help. Contact a personal injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.

Psychiatrists Want a New Name for PTSD

Personal Injury Attorney — Wed, 09 May 2012 21:45:00 GMT

Thousands of individuals suffer from post-traumatic-stress disorder (PTSD), a condition characterized by a wide variety of intense symptoms experienced in the wake of a traumatic event. As incidents of PTSD increase in the United States, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) is discussing changing the name of the condition to post-traumatic stress injury (PTSI). They hope that, by removing the word disorder, the new name will carry less of a stigma, encouraging sufferers to seek treatment for their symptoms.

Currently, thousands of soldiers returning from war suffer from PTSD, not to mention many accident victims and/or witnesses to traumatic events. Yet many of those victims do not seek treatment for their often-debilitating symptoms. Dr. Brian Russell, a psychologist involved in the debate over the name change, says, "The word 'disorder' has a connotation among members of the public that I think isn't helpful. We don't want the public thinking everybody (who suffers from PTSD) has some kind of mental disorder." With that goal in mind, the APA is strongly considered removing the word 'disorder', which implies a long-term mental illness, from the condition's name and replacing it with 'injury', which they believe more accurately describes the reason behind the sufferer's symptoms.

PTSD, as it is currently called, is a serious condition caused by trauma; symptoms experienced can negatively impact the life of the victim and his or her family. It is not a form of mental illness, and the condition can be improved with appropriate care. If you or a loved one has suffered from PTSD as the result of the actions of others, you may be entitled to compensation and a drug defect attorney at the firm can help. Contact a personal injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.

AARP Sues Nursing Home over Antipsychotic Drug Prescriptions

Personal Injury Attorney — Wed, 09 May 2012 21:45:00 GMT

The American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) has joined a class-action California nursing home neglect suit which claims the Ventura Convalescent Hospital has broken the law by providing antipsychotic drugs to residents without first obtaining the consent of a family member. The suit also targets Dr. Gary Proffett, who allegedly relied on the nursing home's consent, instead of a family member's, to provide prescriptions for the dangerous medications.

The lead plaintiff on the suit is a 54 year old woman whose mother, a 79 year old Alzheimer's patient, was living in Ventura Convalescent Hospital to undergo rehabilitation after being injured by a fall in November 2010. When the older woman was discharged just three weeks later, her daughter was shocked to discover the vast quantity of prescription medications her mother had been taking in the facility, which included the antidepressants and antipsychotics Zoloft, Ativan and Haldol.

The Alzheimer's patient died on January 28, 2011; lawyers believe that her prescription medications played a role in her passing. The FDA currently issues a black-box warning on antipsychotic medications, because they increase the risk of death in elderly dementia patients like the plaintiff's mother. An increasing number of nursing homes are dispensing these drugs to residents unnecessarily to combat symptoms of agitation, simply because they do not have enough staff to help these patients with less aggressive approaches. The Ventura facility has been cited by the California Department of Health for dispensing unnecessary drugs to its residents.

Nursing home neglect and abuse presents a serious threat to public safety, in large part because the victims are often left unable to speak against their abusers. If you suspect that your loved one has been the victim of nursing home abuse or neglect, you may be entitled to compensation on his or her behalf and a drug defect attorney can help. Contact a personal injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.

Joining an Actos MDL May Be Easier Than You Think

Pharmaceutical Injury Lawyer — Wed, 09 May 2012 20:20:00 GMT

Federal judge Rebecca Doherty who is overseeing the Actos drug injury multidistrict litigation (MDL) has recently made a decision that will make it easier for patients injured by the drug to join the lawsuit. What she signed was a direct-filing order which will allow anyone who has an Actos injury case to be able to join the Louisiana MDL. Thousands of patients suffered the negative side effects of the drug Actos, which was prescribed to treat type 2 diabetes. One of the worst side effects of the drug was bladder cancer, followed by heart failure.

The benefits of an MDL is that all patients injured in the same way can band together so that their voices can be heart by the drug manufacturer. This will also make matters less time-consuming so that a solution can be reached more quickly. If you were injured in this way, speak with a pharmaceutical injury lawyer from our firm. Contact a dangerous drug lawyer at Arnold & Itkin if you believe you should be compensated for your Actos injuries.

Long Term use of Osteoporosis Drugs may be Harmful

Medical Injury Attorney — Tue, 08 May 2012 21:40:00 GMT

A new Food and Drug Administration (FDA) study published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine warns that women who take bone-building drugs to treat osteoporosis are at risk of developing serious and potentially life-threatening side effects. Osteoporosis is a disease that leaves sufferers with brittle bones vulnerable to breakage. A class of drugs known as bisphosphonates is used to stimulate bone growth and fight osteoporosis, but now evidence suggests that they may not be safe for long term use.

In 2011, the (FDA) first voiced concerns that long term use of bisphosphonates like Fosamax, Actonel and Reclast may actually weaken bones, and lead to atypical fractures of the thigh bone, osteonecrosis of the jaw (crumbling of the jaw bone) and esophageal cancer. In the latest study, the FDA echoed its findings from last year, adding the suggestion that younger women should not take these drugs for longer than five years unless they were at particularly high risk of incurring bone fractures. Only older women with extremely low bone density should continue to take these drugs for extended periods, the FDA concludes. Before discontinuing any treatment, however, the FDA notes that it is important to consult with your physician.

Many drugs that we take to prevent one kind of injury actually put us at risk for different, potentially more serious, injuries. If you or a loved one has been harmed by a prescription drug like Fosamax, Actonel or Reclast, you may be entitled to compensation and a drug defect attorney at the firm can help. Contact a medical injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin for a free consultation regarding your case.

What Doctors aren't Telling you about Cellulaze

Personal Injury Attorney — Tue, 08 May 2012 21:35:00 GMT

Cellulaze is a new laser treatment for cellulite removal. It was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the improvement of cellulite for up to three months. While doctors and some patients are touting it as a miracle cure, evidence of potentially serious side effects is already emerging.

Cellulite dimples are caused when bands of connective tissue form between fat deposits, pulling down on the fat tissue and making the skin's surface appear uneven. Cellulaze uses a laser to burn through the connective bands, allowing bumpy areas to rise and appear fuller. The procedure is performed in-office, with a local anesthetic, and some doctors are saying the procedure's results are permanent, even though the FDA only says they last three months. The suggested cost for treating an area of skin the size of an 8x10 sheet of paper is about $7000.

While doctors are touting Cellulaze as the newest and greatest cellulite treatment, the technology behind it was actually used before in the "smart liposuction" procedure to melt deep fat deposits. Concerns about that process caused doctors to stop offering the procedure, and they are now limiting the laser's use to treat superficial areas just beneath the skin's surface.

Even though it is performed just beneath the skin's surface, Cellulaze has already been shown to cause several severe side effects in the few months since it received FDA approval. Patients who have received Cellulaze treatments have developed seroma (a medical condition that leads to the build-up of fluid in the extremities), as well as unsightly, permanent dents in the areas of skin treated by the laser. Over 100 doctors across the United States currently offer Cellulaze to their patients; as the procedure becomes more readily available, more complications are likely to come to light.

Cosmetic procedures are often performed in a doctor's office, not a hospital; when things go wrong, the lack of available medical care can further complicate any potential injury. If you or a loved one has been hurt by a dangerous cosmetic procedure like Cellulaze, you may be entitled to compensation and a pharmaceutical injury attorney at the firm can help. Contact a personal injury attorney at Arnold & Itkin for a free consultation regarding your case.

Report Reveals Current FDA Drug Safety Tracking System Needs Improvement

Drug Injury Lawyer — Tue, 08 May 2012 18:15:00 GMT

A new report published by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) says that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) needs to create a public database to track a drug's safety record even after it receives FDA approval. The IOM is an independent research body that advises the government on scientific matters.

In recent years, the FDA has faced tremendous criticism for approving drugs that have later been shown to cause devastating side effects. Dr. Ruth Faden, co-chair of the IOM committee, notes that, "It is impossible to know all the risks and benefits of a drug before approval." As a result, the IOM recommends adopting a "lifecycle" approach to drug monitoring, calling on the FDA to monitor approved drugs at regular intervals following their market approval. The results would be posted in the proposed public database.

Under current regulations, the FDA must only check on a drug once after it has received approval—at the point when it has been available publicly for 18 months or when it has been used by 10,000 patients, whichever milestone is reached later. This check-in relies on reports submitted by drug manufacturers, doctors and patients. In 2007, the FDA gained the right to compel drug companies to conduct post-approval safety trials such as those recommended by the IOM; the organization says 385 such studies have been conducted since 2008, resulting in 65 drug-labels being updated to include new warnings and safety information. In fact, representatives from the FDA say they now spend as much effort and resources tracking a drug after its approval as they do during the pre-approval process.

While this may be true, FDA representatives responding to the non-binding IOM recommendations expressed concern over the cost of creating such a complex, long-term drug monitoring system. "We support the general concept of enabling the public to clearly monitor relevant safety issues for all drugs," FDA spokeswoman Sandy Walsh said. "However, we feel it would be very challenging to implement these recommendations within our current resources without seriously compromising other critical regulatory activities."

As recent examples of dangerous drugs and medical devices such as Accutane, Actos and transvaginal mesh have shown, the risks associated with drugs in the post-approval stage are too high to be ignored. All agencies face budgetary concerns, but keeping consumers safe from dangerous drugs and medical devices should be the FDA's highest priority, regardless of the cost. If you or a loved one has been injured by a dangerous drug or medical device after it received FDA approval, you should not hesitate to get the involvement of a drug injury lawyer from our firm. Contact a medical injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.

Pain Experts in Unethical Relationship with Makers of Painkillers

drug Injury Attorney — Mon, 07 May 2012 21:35:00 GMT

Two senators have opened an investigation into financial ties between the producers of prescription painkillers and pain experts in the medical field. The Senate Finance Committee published several letters saying that the inquiry was being conducted to make sure that doctors and patients were getting accurate information about the risks and benefits of the drugs, and that the information was untainted by financial incentives or interests.

Senator Max Baucus, one of the investigators, said, "Overdoses on narcotic painkillers have become epidemic and it's becoming clear that patients aren't getting a full and clear picture of the risks posed by their medications." Senator Baucus, together with Senator Charles Grassley, sent letters to three painkiller manufacturers, including Purdue Pharma (makers of OxyContin), Endo Pharmaceuticals (makers of Percocet) and Johnson & Johnson (makers of Duragesic).

The Senators also sent letters of inquiry to five groups that advocate for access to prescription pain medication: The American Pain Foundation, the American Academy of Pain Medicine, the American Pain Society, the Wisconsin Pain and Policy Studies Group and the Center for Practical Bioethics. One of the groups, the American Pain Foundation, announced on May 3 that it would cease all its operations, just days after receiving a letter from Baucus and Grassley. The organization received 90% of its $5 million 2010 funding from the drug and medical-device industry. The guides the foundation provided for patients, journalists and policymakers traditionally played down risks and emphasized benefits associated with the uses of narcotic painkillers.

The letters suggested that drug companies "may be responsible, at least in part, for the epidemic (of painkiller overdoses) by promoting misleading information about the drugs' safety and effectiveness." By receiving substantial funding from drug manufacturers, advocacy groups become complicit in these acts as well.

Like all prescription drugs, narcotic-strength painkillers carry the potential for serious side effects, and should only be used when absolutely necessary. The rise in painkiller addictions and overdoses in the U.S. is clear evidence that the pills are being used in situations where they are not strictly necessary. If you or a loved one was given an unnecessary prescription for pain killers and suffered an injury as a result, you may be entitled to compensation and a pharmaceutical injury attorney at the firm can help. Contact a drug injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation.

Too Many Medications Don't Provide Children's Dosing Information

Medical Injury Attorney — Mon, 07 May 2012 21:30:00 GMT

A new study published by researchers at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reveals that at least half of the drug labels they reviewed did not contain any information related to the safety of the medication in children or dosing instructions for younger patients. The findings reflect results from evaluations of over 500 different drug labels.

For the purpose of the study, a label was considered to contain "adequate" instructions for use in children if it included information on the drug's efficacy in kids and whether or not it was safe for usage in children or teenagers. Two hundred and thirty one of the drugs were properly labeled; 29 had some, but not all, of the necessary dosing information. The rest of the labels, 54%, contained no useful pediatric information.

The reason behind the missing information is a lack of research relevant to children's safety information. Dr. Eric Lavonas, from the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center acknowledges that, "doing pediatric studies is hard," and pediatric drug studies would be necessary to offer accurate information related to the appropriate drug usage in kids. The lack of pediatric drug studies in the country is a growing problem that has already been addressed in a report by the Institute of Medicine.

Medications for diseases that are less common in children, like cancer and heart disease, are most lacking in relevant pediatric dosing information. Lavonas says, "The number of children available with a disease is usually less, and there are very real challenges to doing research on therapy for children ethically."

Because this lack of research leaves parents and doctors in tough positions when they need to treat children for illnesses, the FDA offers incentives to companies that conduct testing and include pediatric information on their drug labels. The FDA can also refer some drugs to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), allowing that agency to conduct independent research related to appropriate uses in children. Still, without accurate, long-term studies, Lavonas says we're, "often stuck adjusting an adult dose to the size of the child without any real data to show whether that's the ideal dose. If (the therapy) doesn't work, it's hard to tell if your dose wasn't ideal or if it's just because the drug didn't work. Likewise if a child has a side effect, it's hard to tell if that's a side effect of the drug or if the child wouldn't have had that side effect if the right dose was given."

No drug can be considered truly safe without relevant research to provide appropriate guidelines for usage. If your child has been injured by taking a drug which did not offer guidelines for pediatric dosing, you may be entitled to compensation and a pharmaceutical injury attorney at the firm can help . Contact a medical injury attorney from Arnold & Itkin today for a free consultation regarding your case.