Membership-based health care group purchasing organization AmeriNet (St. Louis, Missouri) has signed a contract with Camtronics Medical Systems (Hartland, Wisconsin), a subsidiary of Analogic (Peabody, Massachusetts), for Camtronics' Vericis for Cardiology Image and Information Management System. The three-year agreement became effective Aug. 1. Camtronics is a provider of multi-modality cardiovascular information systems for inpatient and outpatient settings. Vericis for Cardiology acquires and manages patient data from cardiac catheterization studies, hemodynamic monitoring, intravascular ultrasound, echocardiography, nuclear cardiology and other information sources, and provides enterprise-wide access to a single digital patient folder for the cardiac patient. AmeriNet members also are able to obtain Camtronics' Vericis PhysioLog Hemodynamic Monitoring and Data Management System, which integrates complete functionality for real-time waveform analysis, data collection, inventory management, patient charting, image capture and analysis, and procedural reporting.

AST Products (AST; Billerica, Massachusetts), a developer of water-based coatings for medical devices, has completed a licensing agreement with Occam International BV. The agreement is a worldwide non-exclusive licensing for AST's LubriLAST coatings on Occam's Vigor vascular balloon catheters, for percutaneous transluminal cardio angioplasty (PTCA). Occam develops PTCA angioplasty catheters, stent delivery systems and PTCA-related accessories.

Basis Technology (Cambridge, Massachusetts), a provider of products and services for software globalization and multi-lingual information processing, has completed an internationalization project with Heartlab (Westerly, Rhode Island), a developer of cardiac image management software. Heartlab partnered with Basis Technology to internationalize its Encompass Review Station software in preparation for its global distribution, with Japan as the first international market. By Unicode-enabling the product, Heartlab said it would be able to support Japanese and seamlessly add other languages in the future. In addition, Basis Technology worked closely with Heartlab to add support for the international features of the DICOM standard for the transmission of medical images and their associated information. The Encompass Review Station is part of the Encompass cardiovascular information management system which gives cardiologists access to all the cardiac patient information they need to make more timely, informed decisions. Toshiba Medical Systems distributes Heartlab's Encompass products in Japan under the name CardioAgent. Heartlab also entered into an agreement with Diagnostic Imaging (DI; Jacksonville, Florida) in which DI will distribute Heartlab's Encompass Cardiac Network in the U.S. Encompass connects to most cardiac X-ray and ultrasound systems using the DICOM communications protocol.

EP MedSystems (EPMD; West Berlin, New Jersey) has received the first of a series of equity investments from Boston Scientific (Natick, Massachusetts). The companies also have agreed to collaborate in a strategic joint-development project in electrophysiology. The initial equity investment may be followed by additional investments depending upon the progress of the development project. Terms of the equity investment and the joint development project were not disclosed. EPMD develops cardiac electrophysiology products used to diagnose and treat certain disorders of cardiac rhythm.

Novare Surgical Systems (Cupertino, California) and CoroNeo (Montreal, Quebec) have entered into a distribution agreement, in which Novare will be the exclusive distributor in the U.S. of CoroNeo's family of reusable surgical instruments for cardiac procedures. Those products include titanium stabilizing systems for improving surgical accessibility during beating-heart bypass graft procedures, and tissue retractors for mitral and aortic valve surgery.

Terumo Cardiovascular Systems (Terumo CVS; Ann Arbor, Michigan) and Pall Medical (East Hills, New York) signed a distribution agreement appointing Terumo CVS the exclusive distributor for Pall cardiovascular products in North, Central, and South America and in Europe. Pall cardiovascular products include a variety of filters used in the extracorporeal circuit during heart surgery to remove micro-air and other embolic particles from the blood. Terumo CVS, a subsidiary of Terumo (Tokyo), makes monitoring systems and cardiopulmonary bypass products for U.S. and other global cardiac surgery markets. It has been actively engaged in expanding its product portfolio through partnerships and acquisitions as well as internal development. Pall develops systems in the fields of filtration, separations and purification. Its business is organized around two markets: life sciences and industrial.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has agreed to purchase additional automated external defibrillators (AEDs) from Cardiac Science (Irvine, California). The VA ordered 226 of Cardiac Science's Powerheart defibrillators for hospitals and outpatient clinics in facilities in Florida, Puerto Rico, Washington, Michigan, Massachusetts, Missouri, and Texas. The VA previously purchased Cardiac Science's devices for a five-state area in the Midwest. Cardiac Science calls the Powerheart "the only FDA-approved patient monitor for hospitalized cardiac patients with life-threatening heart rhythms."