March 6, 2007 — St. Jude Medical Inc. has announced FDA clearance for its Venture Wire Control Catheter on a rapid exchange delivery platform, a delivery design that accommodates shorter guide wires and may result in quicker, easier coronary procedures.

March 6, 2007 — A first-of its-kind study has shown that cardiac arrhythmias, one of the most common yet potentially dangerous heart conditions affecting more than four million Americans, often go undetected despite medical monitoring, resulting in more than 780,000 hospitalizations and contributing to approximately 500,000 deaths each year, according to AHA.

March 6, 2007 — Federal health advisors recommended in a 9-2 vote that the FDA not approve the Chronicle Implantable Hemodynamic Monitor from Medtronic, a device intended to detect worsening heart failure. A study of the device by the manufacturer suggested it is not effective.

FDA is not required to follow its advisory committees’ advice but does so most of the time.

The device functions by taking heart rate, temperature, pressure and patient activity measurements. The data can be downloaded by doctors in the office or securely transmitted to the Web for viewing.


There has been a big buzz circling around the medical community of late about the viability and value of placing PACS into operating rooms (OR) and intensive care units (ICU). Numerous studies have been published in recent years about many of the benefits associated with this newest wave of technology application.

Even before the federal government began pushing for universal adoption of electronic health records and the establishment of a nationwide health information network, most hospitals saw the need for systems integration. Being able to access critical patient data at the point of care, at the nurse's station or from remote sites became the rallying cry of doctors and nurses.

The climate of today's technology landscape within the healthcare arena seems to be changing at an ever-increasing rate. That can be either good news or great news depending on where you are in the need-to-purchase pipeline. Fortunately, for those needing to purchase inventory management systems, the climate will be like taking a trip to the Bahamas, metaphorically speaking.

Today’s busy emergency departments have an arsenal of imaging tools at their disposal when triaging and diagnosing trauma patients. Increasingly, ED physicians are turning to more sophisticated technologies in addition to proven standbys — such as ultrasound, CR and DR — when diagnosing victims.


The prevalence of obesity in the U.S. is alarming, claiming nearly a third of the nation's adult population, according to the CDC.1 And the negative physical and emotional consequences are sobering: Diabetes, joint degeneration, hypertension, cardiac disease and sleep apnea are among the many serious co-morbidities associated with this disease. Because obesity contributes to significant reduction in health status and eventually death, healthcare professionals frequently encounter extremely sick hospitalized patients suffering from serious obesity-related co-morbidities.

Feb. 23, 2007 — West Virginia holds the dubious rank of the state with the highest percentage of residents with heart disease (10.4 percent), according to a study released this month by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The lowest ranking state on the survey is Colorado.

Variations in lifestyle risk factors for heart disease vary state to state, the report suggested, which may account for the geographic disparities in the number of heart attacks and the incidence of heart disease.

Feb. 23, 2007 — Dr. William T Abraham of Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio and Dr. Patrick M McCarthy of Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, have agreed to become the Co-Principal Investigators for C-Pulse Feasibility Trial in the U.S. Australia-based Sunshine Heart, a global medical device company, says it is committed to the commercialization of the C-Pulse, an implantable, non-blood contacting, mechanical heart assist device for the treatment of people with heart failure.

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