Latex allergies become focus of suits by medical personnel.

Health care workers who frequently wear latex gloves may develop debilitating, if not life-threatening, allergies to proteins contained in the products, a Maryland plaintiffs' attorney warns.

Robert Jenner, of Bethesda, Maryland, is handling several of the estimated 100 products liability cases filed nationwide involving latex-protein allergies. He said a recent medical journal reported that as many as 10 percent of health care workers--from surgeons and nurses to dentists and lab technicians--suffer from some degree of the allergy.

Reports of allergic reactions among medical personnel have been documented since the late 1970s. But Jenner said incidences have increased substantially since the 1980s, when more health care workers began wearing latex gloves as recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as a precaution against AIDS transmission.

As the demand for gloves has increased, Jenner said, manufacturers have speeded up latex production. To produce more latex faster, manufacturers have changed processing techniques, which in many cases leaves more extractable proteins in the final product. Repeated exposure to these proteins is the apparent cause of most latex allergies, Jenner said.

"Simply put, as the industry attempted to speed up the process of manufacturing gloves, the protein content increased, causing severe, irreversible allergic reactions," he said.

The most common allergic response to latex is contact dermatitis, which typically appears on the hands after using latex gloves. If latex exposure is stopped, the dermatitis usually fades within a few days. If exposure continues, however, the lesions may become chronic and could lead to death via an anaphylaxis--or suffocation-response.

"People have died from the allergy" Jenner said. "At the very least, affected health care providers may have to leave their jobs because they can't be exposed to latex. They could use vinyl gloves on their hands, but the air in hospitals or other medical settings is filled with latex proteins, so it's not just wearing the gloves that causes the problem."

Jenner said if chronic allergies to latex develop, the afflicted person may become highly sensitive to any latex product. "Many people with severe allergies can't walk into toy stores or shoe stores, go to birthday parties where there are latex balloons, use condoms or diaphragms, eat in restaurants where the cooks wear rubber gloves, wear underclothes that contain elastic--the list is endless," according to fenner.

An ATLA litigation group has formed for lawyers handling cases involving latex-protein allergies. For more information, call Jenner at [phone].