Advanced Bionics HiRes Ultra & Ultra3D Cochlear Implants

Based upon our more than 10 years of experience of pursuing legal claims against cochlear implant manufacturers, the short answer to this question is a resounding “no.”  If anything, based upon our experience, the situation is exactly the opposite. Please contact us if you want to discuss this concern further.

No. Your cochlear implant is an important piece of evidence in your legal claims, and we start work well before your surgery to ensure that it is preserved and protected accordingly. We also manage any failure analysis testing to be performed on your explanted device. Medical device companies have lawyers, engineers, and scientists working for them-- medical device recipients should level the playing field and have the same help.

The general answer to this question is that you certainly can wait-- your legal claims belong to you, and you can decide when (or if) you bring them. However, one critical issue that prospective clients often fail to consider when thinking about this question is that every state has legal limitations periods (statutes of limitations and repose) that limit the ability to pursue medical device legal claims if they are not filed quickly enough. Depending upon the specific state involved, that limitations period could be as short as one year. This means that you could lose your legal rights before you ever assert them. Please contact us with questions about limitations periods, so that we can discuss your specific circumstances further.

The answer to this question is an emphatic no. Children have legal rights too, and we can pursue their claims through parents or "next friends" that act on the child's behalf. Please contact us for a free no-obligation consultation concerning your child’s potential legal claims—even if Advanced Bionics has already paid a “settlement” to you and/or your child, or had you sign a purported “release” of your child’s claims. Your child may have additional legal rights and remedies available.

One of the principal issues in these cochlear implant legal claims is what did Advanced Bionics know, and when did it know it. Notably, the Zurich, Switzerland (where Advanced Bionics’ parent company is based) newspaper, NZZ am Sonntag, reported on November 6, 2021 that some cochlear implant clinics in Germany and Switzerland have found alleged defects in a shocking 50% of Advanced Bionics’ now recalled HiRes Ultra and HiRes Ultra 3D model cochlear implants. The newspaper further reported that Advanced Bionics continued to sell the allegedly defective cochlear implant models (those with serial numbers below 2000000) even after receiving reports from German surgeons of multiple failures at the German Hearing Center in Hanover Germany, leading the newspaper to publicly question “Was the Device Recall Too Late?” We would be happy to discuss this issue with you further.