• Cook (Bloomington, Indiana) reported the availability of the double lumem Thal-Quick chest tube designed to improve pleural drainage. The device’s 17-gage second lumen allows for increased aspiration or infusion, as the treatment channel can be used for either additional drainage or substance infusion to permit pleural drainage. This latest version of the Thal-Quick chest tube, with a second lumen and 24 French size catheter is intended to improve ease-of-use and placement of the device, as well as patient comfort. The wire guide allows a quick and direct route to the pleural drainage site. The chest tube inserter, which is fitted to the chest tube, provides a smooth transition for insertion over the wire guide, enhancing navigation and placement of the chest tube, Cook said.

• Cook Women’s Health (Spencer, Indiana), a division of Cook (Bloomington, Indiana), reported the availability of its MINC Benchtop Incubator for in vitro fertilization (IVF). The MINC is intended to provide fertility clinics and embryologists with unprecedented embryonic environmental control. Every time an incubator is opened by a user the embryonic environment is changed, potentially leading to chromosomal breakdowns. The MINC is a compact and efficient incubator designed to significantly reduce the amount of time embryos are exposed to disruptions in temperature and pH levels — it takes only three minutes to reach environmental homeostasis in the MINC versus nearly two hours in other incubators available. Cook makes minimally invasive medical device technology for diagnostic and therapeutic procedures.

• Celleration (Eden Prairie, Minnesota) reported the results of a clinical study on the effectiveness of MIST Ultrasound Therapy for the healing of chronic wounds. The study was conducted in a tertiary-referral hospital-based wound clinic. Overall, 69% of the wounds in the study were healed using an intent-to-treat model, Celleration said. When low-frequency, non-contact ultrasound (MIST Therapy) was used as a stand-alone device median time to healing was 7 weeks. Historic controls were healed with a median time to healing of 10 weeks; however, a significant number of them required wound-related hospitalization and surgical procedures to achieve closure compared with the wounds in the study. Celleration’s non-contact MIST Technology can be used on a variety of wounds including, acute, traumatic, chronic and dehisced wounds to promote wound healing. MIST Therapy is a bioactive therapy intended to promote healing through cell stimulation while removing bacteria. Celleration develops therapeutic ultrasound platform.

• Novadaq Technologies (Toronto), a developer of medical imaging systems for the operating room, said it has begun the first human trial with the Luna System. Novadaq said it developed the Luna System to enable surgeons to visualize nerves, tissue perfusion and lymph nodes during urological applications, including but not limited to, radical prostatectomy surgery. This first trial recently enrolled and imaged its first patients at the Strong Memorial Hospital, University of Rochester (Rochester, New York). The first application uses the Luna System to assist the surgeon to evaluate and identify tumor margins in kidney tumors. It is anticipated that successful tumor identification will aid the surgeon in removing as much of the tumor as possible, while preserving normal tissue. The trial is designed to evaluate the clinical utility of the images, as well as correlate the findings to standard histopathology determinations of tumor margins.