The U.S. FDA granted 510(k) clearance to Lantheus Holdings Inc.'s artificial intelligence (AI)-enhanced automated bone scan index (aBSI) product for prostate cancer on GE Healthcare's Xeleris platform. ABSI improves quantification and management of disease progression in advanced prostate cancer patients.

TORONTO – A Canadian plant-based, cellulose scaffold implant for regenerating healthy spinal cord tissue has received U.S. FDA breakthrough device designation. The designation will enhance the process by which Ottawa-based Spiderwort Inc. interacts with the FDA during regulatory review of the Cellubridge implant, said Spiderwort CSO and cofounder Andrew Pelling, speeding its way to clinical trials.

Some PMA filings manage to scrape by at U.S. FDA advisory hearings, but the application for the Visability device by Refocus Group Inc. was not one of those. The panel voted 15-1 that the benefits of the device for presbyopia did not outweigh the risks, leaving the sponsor with a fundamental question about the viability of a technology that has been under development for more than 20 years.

Novocure Ltd. has scored another win, this time gaining the CE mark for the NovoTTF-100L system. As a result, Novocure plans to commercialize the device as a first-line treatment in combination with pemetrexed and platinum-based chemotherapy for unresectable, locally advanced or metastatic, malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM).