Jennifer Stamps v. Collagen Corporation

984 F.2d 1416, 1993 WL 43588
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedMarch 19, 1993
Docket92-2084
StatusPublished
Cited by136 cases

This text of 984 F.2d 1416 (Jennifer Stamps v. Collagen Corporation) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Jennifer Stamps v. Collagen Corporation, 984 F.2d 1416, 1993 WL 43588 (5th Cir. 1993).

Opinion

JERRY E. SMITH, Circuit Judge:

Contending that she contracted a rare autoimmune disease from being injected with defendant Collagen Corporation’s (“Collagen”) products, Jennifer Stamps filed suit to recover damages in state court, alleging causes of action based upon defective design, inadequate warnings, and negligent failure to warn. Collagen timely removed and thereafter moved for summary judgment. The district court found all of Stamps’s state law claims to be preempted by federal law and granted summary judgment. We affirm.

I.

A.

Zyderm and Zyplast are so-called Class III medical devices regulated under the Medical Device Amendments of 1976 (“MDA”), 21 U.S.C. §§ 360C-3601, pursuant to which the Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) classifies all medical devices in one of three categories. See 21 U.S.C. § 360c. Class I devices generally pose little or no threat to public health and safety; tongue depressors are an example. Accordingly, Class I devices are subject only to general controls on manufacturing processes.

Class II items are more complex than Class I and include such devices as oxygen masks used in anesthesiology and tampons. These may be subject to recommendations, guidelines, post-marketing surveillance, the development of patient registries, and even the promulgation of specific performance standards, should the FDA deem them a sufficient health hazard as to require strict product specifications or warnings. See 21 U.S.C. § 360c(a)(1)(B).

*1419 Class III devices, such as Zyderm, require premarket approval (“PMA”), which process permits the FDA to determine whether a proposed product provides “reasonable assurance of its safety and effectiveness.” 21 U.S.C. § 360c(a)(1)(C). Such devices are subject to the more stringent PMA process because they “present[] a potential unreasonable risk of illness or injury.” 21 U.S.C. § 360c(a)(1)(C)(ii)(II).

The PMA process requires a manufacturer to submit a detailed application to the FDA, including information pertaining to product specifications, intended use, manufacturing methods, and proposed labeling. See 21 U.S.C. § 360e(c). The FDA refers each application to a panel of qualified experts that prepares a report and recommendation. Within six months, the FDA must either accept or reject the application. 21 U.S.C. § 360e(d).

B.

In March and April 1988, Stamps was injected with Zyderm and Zyplast, which contain processed bovine collagen that Collagen markets as an anti-wrinkle treatment for middle-aged women. A typical treatment consists of a series of injections directly under the skin, the collagen then remaining to smooth out any wrinkles or deformities on the skin’s surface.

Shortly after receiving her injections, Stamps began complaining of muscle and joint pains that subsequently were diagnosed as dermatomyositis/polymyositis (“DM/PM”). DM/PM is a relatively rare autoimmune disease in which an individual’s immune system identifies one’s own skin and muscle tissue as foreign and attacks them. Stamps claims that Collagen’s products attached to her tissues and provoked an immune response that destroyed her body tissue.

II.

In granting summary judgment, the district court likened, the instant case to Moore v. Kimberly-Clark Corp., 867 F.2d 243 (5th Cir.1989), in which we found a plaintiff’s state-law-based failure-to-warn and labeling claims regarding a Class II medical device (tampons) to be preempted, although her defective construction and design claims survived. Reasoning that collagen implants are regulated under Class III, which requires FDA pre-market approval of not just labeling and packaging, but manufacturing methods as well, see, e.g., 21 C.F.R. §§ 814.20, 814.80, the court concluded that Stamps’s claims are completely preempted.

Appellant Stamps disputes the district court’s interpretation of the MDA and its application of Moore, contending that the MDA neither expressly nor impliedly preempts general state tort law and that Moore must be limited to the Class II regulatory context it describes. As a final matter, Stamps argues that even if we find Moore compelling precedent in the Class III context as well, the most it can be said to require is the preemption of her defective labeling and negligent failure-to-warn claims; her products liability, fraud, and negligence per se causes of action, as in Moore, should be reinstated.

III.

The question is whether the MDA preempts Stamps’s state law claims. The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution invalidates state laws that “interfere with, or are contrary to” federal law. U.S. Const. art. VI, cl. 2. When “the field which Congress is said to have pre-empted has been traditionally occupied by the States ... ‘we start with the assumption that the historic police powers of the States [are] not to be superseded by the Federal Act unless that [is] the clear and manifest purpose of Congress.’ ” Jones v. Rath Packing Co., 430 U.S. 519, 525, 97 S.Ct. 1305, 1309, 51 L.Ed.2d 604 (1977) (quoting Rice v. Santa Fe Elevator Corp., 331 U.S. 218, 230, 67 S.Ct. 1146, 1152, 91 L.Ed. 1447 (1947)) (citations omitted); see also Hillsborough County v. Automated Medical Lab., 471 U.S. 707, 715, 105 S.Ct. 2371, 2376, 85 L.Ed.2d 714 (1985) (recognizing a “presumption that state or local regulation of matters related to health and safety is not invalidated under the Supremacy Clause”). *1420 Accordingly, “ ‘[t]he purpose of Congress is the ultimate touchstone’ ” of preemption analysis. Malone v. White Motor Corp., 435 U.S. 497, 504, 98 S.Ct. 1185, 1190, 55 L.Ed.2d 443 (1978) (quoting Retail Clerks v. Sehermerhorn, 375 U.S. 96,103, 84 S.Ct. 219, 222, 11 L.Ed.2d 179 (1963)).

Congress’s intention to preempt may be either express or implied from the statutory text.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Funk v. Stryker Corp.
673 F. Supp. 2d 522 (S.D. Texas, 2009)
Mills v. Warner-Lambert Co.
581 F. Supp. 2d 772 (E.D. Texas, 2008)
Betterton v. Evans
351 F. Supp. 2d 529 (N.D. Mississippi, 2004)
Horn v. Thoratec Corp
Third Circuit, 2004
Petty v. Gulf Guaranty Insurance
303 F. Supp. 2d 815 (N.D. Mississippi, 2003)
Nathan Kimmel, Inc. v. DowElanco
64 F. Supp. 2d 939 (C.D. California, 1999)
Worthy v. Collagen Corp.
967 S.W.2d 360 (Texas Supreme Court, 1998)
Easterling v. Cardiac Pacemakers, Inc.
986 F. Supp. 366 (E.D. Louisiana, 1997)
Cartegena v. Continental Airlines, Inc.
10 F. Supp. 2d 677 (S.D. Texas, 1997)
Steele v. Collagen Corp.
54 Cal. App. 4th 1474 (California Court of Appeal, 1997)
Milkiewicz v. Baxter Healthcare Corp.
963 F. Supp. 1150 (M.D. Florida, 1996)
Kernats v. Smith Industries Medical Services
Appellate Court of Illinois, 1996
Kernats v. Smith Industries Medical Systems, Inc.
669 N.E.2d 1300 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1996)
Connelly v. Iolab Corp.
927 S.W.2d 848 (Supreme Court of Missouri, 1996)
Fiore v. Collagen Corp.
930 P.2d 477 (Court of Appeals of Arizona, 1996)
Berish v. Richards Medical Co.
928 F. Supp. 185 (N.D. New York, 1996)
Chertkov v. TPLC, Inc.
916 F. Supp. 608 (N.D. Texas, 1996)
Burgstahler v. AcroMed Corp.
670 A.2d 658 (Superior Court of Pennsylvania, 1995)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
984 F.2d 1416, 1993 WL 43588, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/jennifer-stamps-v-collagen-corporation-ca5-1993.