Lund, Sweden based-Paindrainer AB received notification from the European Patent Office that it intends to grant this patent application for its digital tool, Paindrainer, which coaches users in managing their pain and provides guidance on how to reach a personalized activity balance to reach an optimal functional level and alleviate pain.

Integra Lifesciences Holdings Corp. will not launch any new product in the EU before the U.S. because of the challenging requirements under the new Medical Device Regulation, Stuart Hart, chief medical officer at the Princeton, New Jersey-based company, told delegates at the LSX conference in London.

Abbott Laboratories received U.S. FDA approval for its Esprit below-the-knee (BTK) everolimus-eluting resorbable scaffold system for use in chronic limb-threatening ischemia well ahead of the expected second half 2024 time frame. Esprit showed clear superiority to angioplasty in the LIFE-BTK trial presented at last year’s Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics conference and published in The New England Journal of Medicine.

The U.S. FDA has posted the long-awaited final rule for lab-developed tests, which amends the draft rule in a few key respects, but Reps. Diana DeGette and Larry Buchson, once again voiced their opposition to the rule. DeGette and Bucshon acknowledged that congressional inaction has left the FDA with few choices, but called again for passage of the Verifying Accurate, Leading-edge IVCT Development (VALID) Act, which they said is critical because “burdensome regulation of these medical products creates uncertainty in the future of innovation and patient care.”

Acrivon Therapeutics Inc.’s $130 million financing disclosed April 9 hiked confidence in then-pending data with ACR-368 (prexasertib), the selective small-molecule inhibitor that targets checkpoint kinase 1 (CHK1) and CHK2. Undergoing tests in a potentially registrational phase II trial across multiple tumor types, ACR-368 also raised the stakes for Boundless Bio Inc., which is developing CHK1 inhibitor BBI-355.

In what represents just the third PCT filing to have been published in the name of Zurich, Switzerland-based Siva Health AG, protection is sought for a computer-implemented method of classifying an individual suffering from chronic cough.

Device recalls may seem an ordinary fact of life, given that some are declared for reasons as innocuous as a change of labeling, but the five device recalls announced by the U.S. FDA April 24 and 25 include one product withdrawal. The recall for the Nimbus series of infusion pumps and administration sets by Infutronix LLC cited instances in which patients were subjected to out-of-specification analgesia flow rates, and the company has seen fit to remove the existing inventory from the market.

In March, the U.S. FDA reported a major shortage of Rhogam, the anti-D immune globulin most widely used to prevent Rh factor incompatibility in pregnancy. Without treatment, second and subsequent pregnancies can be endangered by antibodies created by the mother. With the shortage, the standard treatment of two shots for all pregnant females with Rh-negative blood can be challenging, but Billiontoone Inc.’s Unity prenatal test can eliminate the need for the immune globulin treatment in 40% of these pregnancies.