Exactech Bellwether Delay Pushes First Trial to September 2025
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Plaintiffs will have to wait longer than expected for the first Exactech hip and knee replacement lawsuits to go to trial. Judge Nicholas Garaufis, who is overseeing the multidistrict litigation (MDL) related to the company’s recalled orthopedic devices, announced new trial dates for the two previously selected cases in an order that was filed on Oct. 18.
The Tarloff trial was moved to Sep. 29, 2025 after previously being scheduled for July 6 of that year and the Larson trial will now get underway on Nov. 10, 2025, moving back a bit from its previously announced September date. Both cases involve defective knee implants.
As part of the order, Judge Garaufis also accepted a request to delay scheduling for future bellwether trials beyond those two. Pretrial dates are likely not coming any time soon either, with those proposals not due until after a scheduled January 2025 meeting.
Bellwether trials are a key part of the MDL process, as they are the first cases to go to trial and serve as representatives for the rest of the cases in the MDL. Their outcomes inform which direction the litigation is headed.
Repeated Trial Delays Due to Discovery Issues in the MDL
This is not the first time that the Exactech MDL has seen a delay, as plaintiffs who filed lawsuits over the failure of their knee and hip implants are still waiting for these cases to go to trial.
The Tarloff and Larson cases have both been repeatedly rescheduled since they were first selected, with original trial dates of June 2025 and August 2025 announced in April.
The dates for those two cases were then swapped in August to allow more discovery time. Then, just a few weeks later, both trials were delayed by over a month.
This latest delay pushes both back even further as discovery issues continue.
Exactech Lawsuits Claim Defective Packaging Led to Failures
Lawsuits against Exactech have continued to rise in the wake of multiple recalls involving the company’s orthopedic products.
This month, there were 1,770 active lawsuits pending in the Exactech MDL, up from just over 1,000 at the start of the year.
Exactech’s issues first began in 2021 when, according to the Food and Drug Administration, the company opted to recall several types of its hip replacement devices over “excessive and premature wear.”
It was eventually discovered that defective packaging was playing a role, with affected devices having been packaged in bags that were missing a layer meant to protect from oxidation.
Without that layer, more oxygen could reach the devices before they were implanted, leading to early wearing, component fractures, pain and even device failure.
Exactech eventually issue multiple recalls over the last few years for devices manufactured between 2004 and 2021 over these packaging and degradation concerns.
Patients are filing lawsuits against Exactech after needing additional procedures to replace devices that broke down early.