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This order created the consolidated litigation.
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On June 5, 2026, the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation ordered federal lawsuits over Boston Scientific spinal cord stimulators centralized in the Central District of California before Judge Josephine L. Staton, creating MDL 3181 — and, in the same order, denied the broader request to sweep every manufacturer’s stimulator cases into one proceeding. The full order is below, hosted as filed. As of the Panel’s October 1, 2026 report, 41 actions were pending in the MDL.
What the order does
The order transfers the actions listed on its Schedule A — cases pending in the Central and Northern Districts of Illinois, the Northern and Southern Districts of Mississippi, and the Central District of California — to Judge Josephine L. Staton for coordinated pretrial proceedings as case number 2:26-ml-03181. Centralization covers common questions about the design, manufacture, and marketing of Boston Scientific’s spinal cord stimulator systems and what the company knew about their failure modes.
What the order declines to do
The Panel denied the motion as to the actions on Schedule B — the request to fold cases against other stimulator manufacturers into the same MDL. That single sentence shaped the litigation’s structure: claims against Abbott, Medtronic, and Nevro proceed separately, and Abbott (MDL No. 3194) and Nevro (MDL No. 3195) have since drawn their own centralization petitions, both granted on October 2, 2026: Abbott to the Northern District of Illinois, Nevro to the Northern District of California. Our MDL 3181 tracker follows all three dockets.
Why the transfer order matters to a patient with a failed stimulator
An MDL is not a class action: each lawsuit remains an individual case, but discovery, expert challenges, and bellwether trials are coordinated before one judge. For a Boston Scientific patient, that means a filed federal case would ordinarily be transferred to Judge Staton’s courtroom for pretrial proceedings. Since August 18, 2026, a new Boston Scientific case can instead be filed directly in the MDL under Pretrial Order No. 4, which also stops the statute of limitations as of the filing date. For patients with Abbott or Nevro devices, venue is now settled: the Panel granted both petitions on October 2, 2026. What the order does not do is decide any question of liability — it is procedural, and every allegation in the underlying complaints remains exactly that at this stage: an allegation.
The same MDL now carries a second set of claims. On September 23, 2026 the court placed the APA claims against the FDA on a procedural track separate from the product liability claims against Boston Scientific.
Reading the order
Three passages worth a reader’s attention: the Panel’s description of the common factual questions (why these cases belong together); Schedule A (which cases started the MDL); and the Schedule B denial (why this MDL is Boston Scientific only). The pending-count anchor for the proceeding is the Panel’s monthly statistics report — 41 actions as of October 1, 2026 — a figure that lags same-week filings; our tracker explains the difference between the two counts.
Sources
- Transfer Order, In re: Boston Scientific Corp. Spinal Cord Stimulator Prods. Liab. Litig., MDL No. 3181 (J.P.M.L. June 5, 2026) — hosted PDF above; obtained via the RECAP archive of the Panel’s docket.
- JPML Pending MDL Dockets by Actions Pending, report dated October 1, 2026.
- Dockets: JPML MDL No. 3181; 2:26-ml-03181 (C.D. Cal.); MDL No. 3194 (Abbott, N.D. Ill.) and MDL No. 3195 (Nevro, N.D. Cal.), both created October 2, 2026.
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Attorney Advertising. This page is general information, not legal advice, and does not create an attorney-client relationship — that relationship is formed only by a signed written agreement. The attorneys of Marin & Murphy Law Firm are licensed in Rhode Island, South Carolina, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. We evaluate potential claims nationwide; for matters arising in states where our attorneys are not admitted, we associate with or refer to locally licensed co-counsel and do not ourselves practice law in those jurisdictions. Submitting the contact form or contacting the firm does not create an attorney-client relationship. Representation is offered on a contingent-fee basis: no fee unless there is a recovery, though a client may be responsible for case costs and expenses. The statute of limitations may sharply limit the time to file a claim. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome, and no outcome is guaranteed. Responsible attorney: Matthew T. Marin, Marin & Murphy Law Firm (South Carolina).