Consumers hope that when they purchase a product, especially a medical device, that it will work properly. For the most part, products and medical devices do work properly and allow people to go about their lives. When a product or medical device fails or breaks, it can injure the consumer. Consumers want to be protected as much as possible when purchasing products or medical devices.
-- What is the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC)?
More than $1 trillion annually is spent on cases involving injury, death and property damage stemming from products or medical devices. The CPSC has a main goal of protecting the public from unreasonable risks of death or injury from thousands of products under their jurisdiction.
Over the past 40 years, the work done by the CPSC to protect the public from hazardous products has reduced the number of injuries and deaths associated with these products. The CPSC protects the public from products that pose various hazards, such as mechanical, chemical, electrical and fire.
The CPSC was created in 1972 and has since performed the following for consumers:
-- Issue and enforce mandatory standards
-- Ban products if no mandatory standard possible to protect the public
-- Create voluntary standards for industries
-- Acquiring the recall of products and helping consumers arrange for the repair or replacement of those products
-- Educating consumers using the media, private organizations and state and local governments
-- Researching possible product hazards
The CPSC does all it can to find issues with products before they harm consumers, but sometimes hazards are not found until an injury or death occurs. Consumers are encouraged to contact the CPSC with information regarding product defects or medical devices that do not work properly.
If you or a loved one has been injured by a defective product or defective medical device, seek medical attention immediately. Do not make a statement to an insurance company until you have spoken with a products liability attorney.
Source: CPSC, "Consumer Product Safety Commission," accessed April 11, 2017