All Clarivate Analytics websites use cookies to improve your online experience. They were placed on your computer when you launched this website. You can change your cookie settings through your browser.

More information on our cookie policy.

BioWorld. Link to homepage.

/images/Cortellis_Flagship_Logo_TM_RGB_Color.png
  • BioWorld
  • BioWorld MedTech
  • BioWorld Asia
  • BioWorld Science
  • Data Snapshots
    • BioWorld
    • BioWorld MedTech
  • Special reports
    • Artificial intelligence
    • Coronavirus
    • Diagnosing and tracking COVID-19
    • Drugs to Watch 2020
    • The next pandemic
    • Premium reports
      • BioWorld Financings Reports
      • Disease Forecast Reports

BioWorld. Link to homepage.

  • Sign In
  • Sign Out
  • My Account
Subscribe
BioWorld - Friday, March 5, 2021
Home » Blogs » BioWorld MedTech Perspectives » Three from MDD; Star Trek, big business, and human foibles

BioWorld MedTech Perspectives
BioWorld MedTech Perspectives RSS FeedRSS

BioWorld MedTech

Three from MDD; Star Trek, big business, and human foibles

May 2, 2013
By Mark McCarty
No Comments

Starship enterprise
Medical science boldly going

 

The pages of Medical Device Daily are chock-full of outstanding content, but here are three stories from the month of April that caught my eye.

Taking the eye out of ouch

Seventh Sense Biosystems announced a registration trial for its TAP (touch-activated phlebotomy) device, which is one of those things that in times gone by was strictly the stuff of science fiction television shows. As my colleague Amanda Pedersen wrote in the April 3 edition, the TAP makes use of microneedles to obtain blood from the capillaries, and can dispense a small dose of anti-coagulant to keep things moving if need be.

This is real Star Trek stuff if you ask me. The company’s CEO, Howard Weisman, perhaps understated the case when he told Amanda the device got around “the pain and anxiety” of routine blood draws “because you don’t see the needle.”

I don’t see myself as particularly squeamish, but I don’t look at needles at all. I turn my head if I need a shot. In my view, you have to be a little crazy if you actually watch it all happen.

Three cheers for Seventh Sense, but tell me again who got sixth?

Consolidation in diagnostic services

Thermo Fisher and Life Technologies shook hands over a deal that would give the latter’s shareholders about $76 a share in a consolidation in the life science services industry. Both companies offer diagnostic lab services, and the terms of the deal make it a purchase coming to close to $14 billion plus any remaining debt on Life Technologies’ books, which may run to about $2 billion.

As Omar Ford wrote in the April 16 edition of Medical Device Daily, Thermo Fisher needed some help from a couple of investment banks to pull it off, which indicates the firm’s board of directors saw this as either too good to pass up or vital to the company’s future … or both. In any case, the deal probably won’t close until early next year.

Will a bidding war for Life Sciences ensue?

Collegiality at hospitals an issue?

Medical errors are still a topic among physicians and policymakers, and former Medical Device Daily executive editor Jim Stommen authored a two-part interview with Frederick Southwick, MD, of the University of South Florida about this.

Southwick told Jim – who I might note is something of a legend among the editorial staff at MDD’s publisher, AHC Media – that one of the impediments to efforts to tamp down on iatrogenic disease and injury is a cultural one. Southwick said hierarchies are of sufficient stiffness in many hospitals that “there is not a sense of collegiality that’s needed in order to foster teamwork.” He also remarked that hospital staff “tend to be disorganized in the way we communicate.”

Don’t get me wrong, I love technology as much as the next policy wonk, but if Southwick is right on the hierarchy point, it’s another demonstration of the need for we humans to get out of our own darn way. This is something technology cannot fix.

I’m not saying I never have such issues, and I’m also not saying I’d trade places with a doctor. People in all lines of work tend to lead with their egos, but when running unchecked in a hospital, this very understandable human impulse can cost lives.

But who, besides Southwick, is talking about it?

You must login or register in order to post a comment.

Report Abusive Comment

Popular Stories

  • Free access to BioWorld coronavirus articles

    BioWorld

    The articles in this collection are from BioWorld’s ongoing coverage of the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak. Note that we have added three critical tables which are...

  • Today's news in brief

    BioWorld
    BioWorld briefs for March 4.
  • Gloved hand places sample tubes in PCR system

    COVID-19 test makers are adapting for variants

    BioWorld MedTech
    As COVID-19 variants have emerged, so have questions about the effectiveness of tests for infection. While the risk of mutations significantly limiting their...
  • Today's news in brief

    BioWorld MedTech
    BioWorld MedTech's briefs for March 4.
  • Celltrion-Regkirona-2-9

    Celltrion wins first conditional Korean approval for COVID-19 antibody Regkirona

    BioWorld
    HONG KONG – Celltrion Inc. has received conditional marketing authorization from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) for its anti-COVID-19 monoclonal...
cortellis ad

BioWorld Premium

Enjoy extended coverage for the most complete market view with BioWorld, BioWorld MedTech, and BioWorld Asia in a single, easy to access subscription.

Subscribe
  • BioWorld
    • Today's news
    • Analysis and data insight
    • Clinical
    • Data Snapshots
    • Deals and M&A
    • Financings
    • Newco news
    • Opinion
    • Regulatory
    • Science
  • BioWorld MedTech
    • Today's news
    • Clinical
    • Data Snapshots
    • Deals and M&A
    • Financings
    • Newco news
    • Opinion
    • Regulatory
    • Science
  • BioWorld Asia
    • Today's news
    • Analysis and data insight
    • Australia
    • China
    • Clinical
    • Deals and M&A
    • Financings
    • Newco news
    • Regulatory
    • Science
  • BioWorld Science
    • About
    • Archives
    • Today's news
    • Search BioWorld Science
  • More
    • About
    • Archives
    • Article reprints and permissions
    • Contact us
    • Cookie policy
    • Copyright notice
    • Data methodology
    • Privacy policy
    • Share your news with BioWorld
    • Staff
    • Terms of use
A Clarivate Analytic solution. Link to Clarivate website.
Follow Us

Copyright ©2021. All Rights Reserved. Design, CMS, Hosting & Web Development :: ePublishing