A surgical device that prompted a $5 million jury award in a Pennsylvania wrongful death case is now the focus of a local lawsuit, filed last month in Deschutes County Circuit Court, against its manufacturer and Cascade Healthcare Community, the parent company of St. Charles in Bend and Redmond.

Gretchen Halvorson maintains in a complaint against New Jersey-based Ethicon Endo-Surgery that the company manufactures an “unreasonably dangerous” surgical stapling device that tore a hole in her colon during a February 2007 procedure in Redmond. The lawsuit says that the stapler, generally used to close surgical incisions made during colorectal and gastric bypass surgeries, misfired and perforated Halvorson’s colon, which later became infected.

“This is what the surgeon said happened,” said Bend lawyer Warren West, who represents Halvorson.

Halvorson is not suing the surgeon who performed the procedure.

Representatives of Ethicon did not return phone calls or an e-mail seeking comment.

But the stapler the company manufactures has been the subject of several lawsuits, according to a database that tracks federal court filings nationwide.

The complaint filed by Halvorson — as well as the other suits filed against Ethicon — alleges that the surgical stapler is dangerous as it was originally designed, West said.

“It’ll be interesting because if this has to go to trial … this is a product liability case, so all I have to prove is that this particular product was unreasonably dangerous at the time,” West said.

Specifically, the suits say the stapler was prone to “misfire” so that staples ejected from it did not close properly.

In Halvorson’s case, West said, the surgeon believed the device had failed to eject a staple when, in fact, the misfire of the stapler perforated her colon, which ultimately became infected.

The tear was discovered three days later during a second surgical procedure because of complications, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit names Cascade Healthcare because it billed the cost of the staplers and the surgical procedure to Halvorson, according to the complaint.

Halvorson seeks $775,000 in damages for medical expenses, ongoing health problems and “physical pain and mental suffering.”

Others claiming to be harmed by the stapling device have sought much more, according to court records.

In May 2007, a jury awarded 53-year-old Daniel Selepec, of Pennsylvania, $5 million in connection with the Ethicon stapler after his wife died of post-surgical complications because of a misfire, according to court documents.

In that case the staples failed to close completely during a 2002 operation and 40-year-old Sandra Selepec’s stomach leaked for a day before surgeons repaired it. She never regained consciousness, however, and died 20 days later.

In a suit filed in 2006, an Indiana couple is seeking unspecified damages alleging that an Ethicon stapler misfired and that staples failed to close during a 2005 hemorrhoidectomy causing “profuse bleeding.”

An Indianapolis judge denied Ethicon’s request that the suit be dismissed in January, and the case is scheduled for trial in April.

And in a third case filed last month, a Maryland man is seeking $10 million, saying an Ethicon stapler misfire caused several staples to be ejected into his bowel, causing extensive tearing and resulting in a colostomy.