What Is The Bard Powerport?
The Bard PowerPort is an implantable venous access device placed beneath the skin, usually in the chest, and connected to a catheter that leads to a large vein near the heart. It's commonly used in cancer patients receiving chemotherapy and those needing long-term IV access for medications or blood draws, reducing the need for repeated needle insertions during treatment.
At the center of the litigation is the catheter's material composition. Bard PowerPort catheters are made from a polyurethane compound called Chronoflex AL, which contains barium sulfate, an additive that makes the catheter visible on X-ray and CT imaging. Plaintiffs allege that this combination is the device's fatal flaw.
According to published research in the Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials, barium sulfate particles near the catheter surface separate over time, creating microscopic notches that make the catheter vulnerable to cracking and breaking apart inside the body.
Plaintiffs further allege that Bard used an excessive concentration of barium sulfate in the Chronoflex material, accelerating degradation and making the catheters more brittle than they should have been. The same surface degradation that creates fracture risk also promotes bacterial colonization, contributing to the serious infections reported by hundreds of patients.
When a catheter fractures, fragments can break loose and travel through the bloodstream to the heart, lungs, or other critical vessels. The consequences can include:
- Cardiac arrhythmia
- Pulmonary embolism
- Vascular perforation
- Emergency surgery
- Death
Plaintiffs claim that Bard concealed adverse event data through the now-discontinued FDA Alternative Summary Reporting program, which allowed manufacturers to submit injury reports to a hidden database instead of the publicly accessible MAUDE database.
The MAUDE database now contains hundreds of adverse event reports related to Bard PowerPort failures, including 438 reports filed between December 2025 and February 2026 alone, reflecting 111 cases of blood clots and 17 cases of pulmonary embolism.
Despite this mounting evidence, Bard has not issued a recall related to the Chronoflex catheter material.
