A Medical Device Daily

Amid growing concern about the increase in hospital-acquired infections and the effort by CMS to avoid paying for their treatment McKesson Provider Technologies (San Francisco) and The Clorox Company (Oakland, California) say they have partnered to focus on reducing these infections.

The companies will develop and promote disinfection protocols for mobile equipment and handheld electronic devices, including computers on wheels, tablet PCs, mobile medication cabinets, and hand-held bar-code scanners for medication administration, specimen tracking and blood verification, commonly used by clinicians in and between patient rooms.

McKesson will team with Clorox to offer jointly developed disinfection protocols in conjunction with McKesson's Patient Care Advantage solution. The solution drives a "one-patient, one-care team, one-plan" approach to care, to enable hospitals to provide safer, more efficient care.

Clorox makes hospital-grade surface-disinfecting products and alcohol-based hand sanitizers.

"McKesson is the only single-source provider of integrated software, automation, packaging, distribution and consulting solutions that help organizations improve efficiency and prevent medication errors at each stage where they can occur," said Mary Beth Navarra, RN, chief patient safety officer for McKesson. "By collaborating with Clorox, we can help customers lower the risk of inadvertently transporting harmful microorganisms among patient rooms."

For example, surfaces that are touched frequently such as door knobs, bed rails, mobile devices and lavatories may accumulate microbes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Atlanta) which recommends a regular schedule of cleaning and disinfection as an adjunct measure to hand hygiene.

In other agreement news:

• BioLife Solutions (Bothell, Washington), a developer and marketer of hypothermic storage and cryopreservation media products for cells, tissues, and organs, provided updated information on the adoption of its products in the cellular therapy and cord blood banking market segments.

BioLife reported that Oncolix (Greenville, South Carolina) is developing a treatment for stage IV melanoma and has adopted CryoStor for the cryopreservation of the company's dendritic cell-based cancer therapy.

Michael Redman, president/CEO of Oncolix, said, "We evaluated other commercial cryopreservation media as well as an in-house formulation and found that CryoStor clearly offered post-preservation improvement in cellular yield and function without the use of human serum. Our 25-patient phase II clinical trial will commence within a few weeks so we're quite pleased that this variable in our development process has been locked down."

BioLife CEO Mike Rice said, "We are currently supporting evaluations of CryoStor at several of the largest cord blood banks in the U.S., Europe, and Asia, and are optimistic that the results of these evaluations will mimic earlier published data about the advantages CryoStor and could lead to further product adoption in this key market."

• Quadraspec (West Lafayette, Indiana) and Antech Diagnostics (Irvine, California) have signed a contract allowing Antech to upgrade their laboratories with Quadraspec's SDI (Spinning Disc Interferometry) detection technology.

Antech is a veterinary diagnostic lab serving more than 12,000 animal hospitals, zoos and government agencies worldwide. Quadraspec has installed the detection technology of Inspira Sample Handlers and Readers in the Lake Success, New York and the Oak Brook, Illinois, laboratories.

Quadraspec technology allows for the processing of 3,500 to 5,000 samples per night with a single reader. The system also features a 272-well format.