The U.S. FDA posted two warning letters to device makers in the second week of March 2024, one each to Exactech Inc., of Gainesville, Fla., and the other to Nobles Medical Technology II Inc., of Fountain Valley, Calif. The themes of these warnings are entirely different, with Noble receiving a warning regarding clinical trial oversight and Exactech taking a hit for routine good manufacturing compliance issues, showing that the FDA is active in the post-COVID compliance realm.
Sooma Oy recently raised €5 million (US$5.4 million) in funding to help the company expand access to its transcranial direct current stimulation device which allows patients to treat their depression at home. “This is a significant milestone for us that enables us to help more patients globally and help us develop the company to serve the unmet need,” Tuomas Neuvonen, Sooma's co-founder and CEO, told BioWorld.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has issued its long-awaited final rule governing emissions of ethylene oxide (EtO), a rule announced by the agency with the concurrence of Xavier Becerra, the Secretary of Health and Human Services. However, the final rule provoked an immediate response from Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who said the final rule will “put American lives in danger.”
There are coincidences and then there are big coincidences, the latter of which might describe a new U.S. FDA draft guidance and a major cybersecurity breach. The agency has issued a draft update to its premarket cybersecurity guidance even as the Department of Health and Human Services announced an investigation into the hack of the IT system at Change Healthcare, a pair of developments that seem likely to set the world of connected medical devices on its collective ear.
Wuxi Apptec quit its membership in the Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO) after U.S. Congressman Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) sent a March 5 letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland, asking the Department of Justice to investigate BIO because its lobbying efforts on behalf of Wuxi suggested it was operating as an unregistered agent of a foreign company while advancing the interests of the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party.
Pulsecath BV secured a CE mark under the Medical Device Regulation (MDR) for its Ivac 2L system, a percutaneous mechanical circulatory support device, four years after it began the process. “It took us four years and we spent more than €700,000 to get approval under the MDR for the same product that we already had CE mark for under the Medical Device Directive for the last 10 years or so,” Oren Malchin, CEO of Pulsecath, told BioWorld.
The news about how the U.S. False Claims Act (FCA) is adjudicated in the courts is typically dismal, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently provided an exception.
Japanese researchers from Chiba University are spearheading new research into Peace of Mind Co. Ltd.’s portable Angel Touch device (AT-04), approved for neurological disorders, to treat endometriosis-related pain.
The European Parliament (EP) has passed the Artificial Intelligence Act (AI Act), bringing the legislation one step closer to full passage into law, with passage by the European Council the only remaining hurdle.
Regulatory harmonization and reliance are the orders of the day at this year’s meeting of the International Medical Device Regulators Forum (IMDRF), but that does not mean individual regulators are waiting for IMDRF to act on their own imperatives.
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