UPDATE ON PATIENTS LAWSUIT AGAINST STEM CELL CLINIC, STEMGENEX

Reprinted from The Niche, January 23, 2017

The website Law360 has an interesting update on the proposed class action lawsuit against the San Diego stem cell clinic Stemgenex.  Note that it seems you can read the full Law360 article without a subscription if you open the site in Chrome as your web browser. Not surprisingly, the plaintiffs and defense see this case in opposite ways as reflected in quotes in the Law360 article: “Plaintiffs make non-specific and conclusory allegations with respect to all named defendants,” StemGenex said. “The second amended complaint is so devoid of any specific facts to support its contentions that it is impossible for defendants to reasonably prepare a defense.” Brian Findley of Mulligan Banham & Findley, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, told Law360 Wednesday that the allegations are “quite specific” and cite false statistics, made-up online reviews, and StemGenex employees.

If customers told the company that the treatment hadn’t done anything, they were told it could take months to see an effect, or that they should buy another treatment, he said.” A key issue, in this case, is the marketing of stem cell offerings from Stemgenex and the plaintiffs allege this marketing was problematic: “The three StemGenex customers, Selena Moorer, Stephen Ginsberg and Alexandra Gardner, all say that they paid the company $14,900 for each stem cell treatments for lupus, diabetes and other ailments after being persuaded by the number of satisfied customers on the company’s website, but that the treatments had no effect.” The Stemgenex website still lists an apparent 100% patient satisfaction marketing claim as of today, January 23, 2017 (see screenshot below). According to the Law360 article, Stemgenex has made various arguments to support their motion for dismissal and they overall called the lawsuit a “fishing expedition.” If you want to follow the case, here is some info:

“The case is Moorer v. StemGenex Medical Group Inc., et al., case number 3:16-cv-02816, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.” It seems likely that more patient suits against stem cell clinics will emerge this year. Some, but not all of the other recent cases of this kind including against US Stem Cell, Inc. and its subsidiary US Stem Cell Clinic have been settled before any judgment was issued. I’m not sure of the status of a different proposed potential class action case against The Lung Institute. If you know of other such lawsuits please contact me or post a comment.