The Pain Brokers Audiobook By Elizabeth Chamblee Burch cover art

The Pain Brokers

How Con Men, Call Centers, and Rogue Doctors Fuel America's Lawsuit Factory

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“Burch is the Jane Goodall of complex litigation. . . . For an expert in such an unlikable form of litigation, Burch is remarkably likable. She is quick to answer questions and quick-witted as well, a purveyor of analogies and metaphors to explicate arcane legal concepts and a walking archive of legal minutiae going back to the origins of product-liability law—the kind of professor a student hopes to find. . . . . Burch’s book cannot make this right, but it at least provides an account far more accessible and comprehensible than any case record, and no less appalling.”
—Casey Cep, The New Yorker

Selling the Dream meets Empire of Pain in this shocking, never-told-before story of three women caught in a web of telemarketing scammers, shady doctors, and profit-hungry lawyers who turned fears surrounding a faulty medical device affecting millions of women into a goldmine.

For decades, late-night television has blared a familiar refrain: If you or a loved one has been injured by X product…

But behind those ads lies a lesser-known world where elaborate scams revictimize the injured. Why else would thousands of women with health insurance take out loans with astronomical interest rates and fly to south Florida to have their pelvic mesh surgically removed at a chiropractor’s clinic?

The Pain Brokers, by law professor Elizabeth Burch, is a damning investigation of a scheme made possible by a medical and legal complex that too often views women’s bodies as cash machines and fails to take their pain seriously.

As Burch unfurls each level to the scheme, we meet an enthralling cast of characters, from a world class scam artist who reaped tens of millions of dollars at a south Florida call center, to the ultimate white shoe power lawyer who defended Big Pharma but became an unlikely hero, to a newly minted small-town Arkansas attorney who advocated for the unseen and unheard. But at the center are three women, Jerri, Barb, and Sharon, whose lives were upended by the very procedure they were told would save them.

A page-turning, urgently necessary work of public service journalism, The Pain Brokers is not only a chilling exposé of a legal system gone awry, but a wake-up call to the ways in which it harms those it is meant to help. Biographies & Memoirs Law True Crime

Critic reviews

"The audiobook illuminates the misdeeds of malevolent marketers, sleazy lawyers, and unethical doctors."
All stars
Most relevant
The cadence reminded me of the audiobook presentation of the Radium Girls. I remained fascinated, perhaps perversely, by the evil inflicted on women in these modern times.

Masterful Presentation

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I didn’t like that the fact that this story was true, but I loved how the author and old it.

Compelling story well told.

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The narrator was excellent! Made the book flow. My heart goes out to every woman who is affected with this sham! To the lawyers like JR Baxter and Barbara, keep up the good fight! The world needs more people like you! To the author, excellent read, very well written! Thank you for sharing this topic!

Excellent Book!

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Hits home as I exist in these worlds
This was an eye opening grift that I was not aware of previously. So sorry for the victims

Unbelievable and accurate

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Really well written. I was gripped for the whole experience. The story woven by the author makes a very complex situation feel accessible

Phenomenal telling of a scary true story

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