Contact lenses factory worker sues over injury caused by allegedly faulty roller trolley

A former operative at a contact lenses manufacturers was injured when she was hit by a metal container that she says fell from a faulty roller trolley she was working at in the factory, the High Court heard.

Margaret Reid (61), a mother of four from Kilmacow in Co Kilkenny, claims she was struck on the neck and right shoulder at the Bausch and Lomb factory in Waterford on May 30th, 2015. She says she continues to suffer severe pain and curtailment of activities arising out of the accident.

The court heard it was the Reid side’s case that the defendant failed to properly maintain a mechanism or catch on the roller trolley, preventing containers known as “towers”, from falling. It was claimed there had been previous incidents of the catches failing and the tower coming off the trolley.

Factory owners, Valeant Pharmaceuticals Ireland, deny negligence and claim culpability on Ms Reid’s part in that she somehow pulled the container from the trolley on to herself.

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The court heard the defendant disputes Ms Reid’s claims about being restricted in her ability to lift things and raise her right arm above her shoulder as a result of the accident.

Valeant’s counsel, Paddy McCarthy SC, put it to her that his side would produce video surveillance evidence of her lifting a dog with her right arm and putting it into the boot of a Honda Civic in October 2017.

Ms Reid replied that she “never drove a Honda Civic; it was my daughter, maybe”.

Her cross-examination continues tomorrow.

Earlier, Elaine Morgan SC, for Ms Reid, told the court the accident was a “very significant and life-changing incident”.

It occurred while Ms Reid was working on the night shift when a tower of contact lenses, which rolls along a trolley, fell from a height, counsel said.

The object was about a stone in weight and hit her shoulder, she said. There was blunt trauma to her neck and right shoulder region, she said.

She was brought to hospital by her husband who also worked at the factory as a maintenance fitter.

She ultimately required surgery to her neck and remains under the care of a nerve specialist, counsel added.

Due to public hospital waiting lists, she has spent some €50,000 on her treatment, counsel said.

This was funded partly from an inheritance her husband got from his father and from Ms Reid’s own redundancy payment from Valeant, she said.

The court heard Ms Reid had put in for redundancy before the accident and had hoped to upskill and return to accountancy or book-keeping on leaving Valeant but this never happened because of the accident.

She was involved in two significant road traffic accidents in 2008 and 2010 for which she was entirely blameless and recovered compensation, counsel said. She had lower back problems as a result but which she had been managing well, she said.

The workplace accident also led to her developing a depressive condition, described by her doctor as moderate, counsel said.

“She tries to get on with things and now has two grandchildren but the consequence [of the accident] is that her life is now very limited, housework is very difficult, but she tries and struggles,” counsel said.

In her direct evidence, Ms Reid said she was not sure but believed the tower fell from a height and hit her as she was bending down to put a tower from a lower level on to another trolley.

After the accident, she first went to her locker to get some paracetamol but could not even open it because of the pain and then went to the nurse’s station in the factory where it was recommended she go to hospital.

She said the pain she suffered was “worse than childbirth”.

The case continues before Mr Justice Mícheál P O’Higgins.