• Zyprexa
• Abuse
• Anorexia
• Claim
• Class Action
• Diabetes Claim
• Effects
• Heart Attack
• Information
• Injuries
• Interaction
• Lawsuit
• Lawyer
• Litigation
• Overdose
• Risks
• Safety
• Settlement
• Strokes
• Warning
• Weight
• Withdrawal

Find a Lawyer in Your State

Need Help?

For more than one year, drug manufacturer Eli Lilly and Co. played down the blood-sugar risks of its best-selling schizophrenia drug Zyprexa, failing to reveal important clinical trial results, according to internal company documents.

A 2000 confidential memo distributed to the top scientists at Lilly, show that patients taking Zyprexa had more than three times the risk of experiencing high blood sugar levels than those using a placebo. This is one of hundreds of internal documents that reveal the increased risks of adverse side effects associated with Zyprexa.

Zyprexa Diabetes Risk

However, the real findings of the drug company''s clinical trials weren''t revealed to the public until years later. Instead doctors and patients worldwide were led to believe that Zyprexa use only slightly increased the risk of high blood sugar in comparison to a placebo.

Another Lilly memo from 1999 shows that the drug maker found—after evaluating 70 clinical studies—that 16 percent of participants using Zyprexa for one year or more gained an average 66 pounds. But Lilly chose to gather their information from a small group of trials that found 30 percent of participants gained only about 22 pounds.

High blood sugar and weight gain are significant risk factors for developing diabetes. While Lilly claims there is no direct link between its schizophrenia drug and the condition, in 2004, the American Diabetes Association found that Zyprexa raised the risk of diabetes more than any other similar drugs.

In 2000, Lilly decided to reanalyze their data, but this announcement came after doctors and drug regulatory agencies had begun to question the risks associated with Zyprexa.

“In 1999, we already were thinking this drug causes weight gain—that''s clear—and there could be a lot of other metabolic consequences of that,” said Harvard psychiatry professor Dr. David N. Osser. “The weight gain itself is a known risk factor for diabetes.”

Zyprexa was prescribed to nearly two million people worldwide in 2005 alone.

Injured by a dangerous drug? Please contact us today to learn more about your legal rights and options.