Abbott Laboratories announced a recall of Freestyle Libre 3 and Libre 3 Plus sensors used in continuous glucose monitors after receiving reports of more than 700 injuries and seven fatalities that may be associated with the sensor malfunction. The company did not describe the nature of the malfunction let alone a root cause, but said the affected product comes from only one of three production lines, and thus it expects no shortages associated with the recall.
The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services released the 1657-page final rule for inpatient payment for calendar year 2026, a document chock full of important policy decisions including a renewed call for elimination of the inpatient-only list.
The resolution of the budget impasse between Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill sidestepped a number of problems, including some cuts to Medicare payment rates for clinical laboratory testing services. However, that pause is only in effect through the end of January 2026, leaving operators of these labs with a fiscal sword of Damocles to manage.
The European Commission posted a series of proposed legislative updates, including the AI Act, which might not come into force for the med tech industry until August 2028 under the terms of this proposal.
A jury has returned a verdict of infringement against Apple Inc., as part of a series of patent disputes with Masimo Corp., producing a damages award of $634 million which is seen in some quarters as an indicator that Masimo has the momentum against Apple.
Aesculap Implant Systems LLC has seen its share of bad news recently, but the company seems to have cleared the legal deck with an agreement to pay $38.5 million per a Nov. 17 announcement by the U.S. attorney’s office for the district of Eastern Pennsylvania.
The Medicare Wasteful and Inappropriate Service Reduction (WISeR) proposal is designed to tamp down on waste, fraud and abuse in the Medicare program, but Jeff Wurzberg, a partner at Norton Rose Fulbright LLP, told BioWorld that the contractors developing these AI models have incentives to return non-covered determinations for services.
Exactech Inc., of Gainesville, Fla., decided it will not subject itself to a 10-year corporate integrity agreement with the Office of Inspector General, an understandable move given that the company no longer intends to do business in the U.S. under its old brand.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has moved to relax reporting requirements for perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances used in a variety of applications, including medical devices.
A team of five members of the U.S. FDA staff published a review of the use of AI in health care and concluded that while hallucinations in AI systems can be minimized, the trade-off is that efforts to minimize hallucinations tend to diminish the AI’s performance.
