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In an ominous sign for patient safety, 71% of reusable medical scopes deemed ready for use on patients tested positive for bacteria at three major U.S. hospitals, according to a new study. The paper, published recently in the American Journal of Infection Control, underscores the infection risk posed by a commonly used endoscopes. It signals a lack of progress by manufacturers, hospitals and regulators in reducing contamination despite numerous reports of superbug outbreaks and patient deaths, experts say. "These results are pretty scary," said Janet Haas, president of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology. "These are very...

Penis pumps cost the U.S. government’s Medicare program $172 million between 2006 and 2011, about twice as much as the consumer would have paid at the retail level, according to a government watchdog’s report released on Monday... < snip >“Considering the strain retiring baby boomers will soon be placing on Medicare’s budget, shouldn’t we be focusing this entitlement program on real, life-saving treatment and equipment to serve the health needs of seniors – instead of subsidizing penis pump purchases?” Ben Domenici of the Heartland Institute think tank said in an email statement. “And to those seniors who really do want...

Michael Shopenn’s artificial hip was made by a company based in this remote town, a global center of joint manufacturing. But he had to fly to Europe to have it installed. Mr. Shopenn, 67, an architectural photographer and avid snowboarder, had been in such pain from arthritis that he could not stand long enough to make coffee, let alone work. He had health insurance, but it would not cover a joint replacement because his degenerative disease was related to an old sports injury, thus considered a pre-existing condition. Desperate to find an affordable solution, he reached out to a sailing...

The recent spate of job cuts in the past several months is proving to be pretty painful to the medical device industry—and a band-aid isn't going to help heal this wound. This month, medical device industry giant Medtronic was the latest to land on the layoff list in light of workforce reductions in its Memphis-based spinal division as well as across its global operations. But the medtech powerhouse, sadly, is not alone in reducing headcount as a means of cutting operating costs. Citing factors ranging from the need to offset the costs of the polarizing medical device excise tax and struggling...

As the fight over Obamacare raged in the House and Senate Wednesday, a new worry emerged that has the potential to push 146,000 high-paid, high-skill American jobs overseas. Former Bush economist Diana Furchtgott-Roth told a House panel that the tiny provision in Obamacare that puts a 2.3 percent tax on "medical devices" such as heart valves, insulin pumps and dental fillings will stifle development of the devices and push production overseas since no other country taxes the items. Testifying before the Energy and Commerce Committee, she said that a 10 percent shift in production overseas would cost up to 64,000...

In 2013, the tax increases in Obamacare will increasingly conspire against kitchen-table family healthcare decisions. As just one example, below are some of the taxes that will impact the purchase of dental braces: Obamacare Medical Device Tax: As of Jan.1, Obamacare imposes a new tax of 2.3 percent on medical device manufacturers, including those who make dental braces. The tax is imposed on gross sales -- even if the company does not earn a profit in a given year. While the tax will be paid to the IRS by the manufacturer, the tax will be passed along as a higher...

The Obama administration earlier this year defended the medical device tax, saying companies actually stand to benefit from the law. lol

Eighteen Democratic U.S. Senators and senators-elect sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid last week calling for a “delay in the implementation” of the medical device tax in Obamacare, the Wall Street Journal reports. The provision was an integral part of the version of the Obamacare law, which was passed in the Senate under Reid’s stewardship in 2009. It is set to take effect on January 1, 2013. An effort to repeal the provision failed in Congress in June. At the time, Reid characterized the proposed repeal as a Republican attack on Obamacare. “The medical technology industry directly...

In a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid, 18 Democrat senators and senators-elect have asked for “a delay in the implementation” of the Obamacare medical device tax. Like most of the significant tax increases in Obamacare, the medical device tax is scheduled to take effect on Jan. 1, 2013, conveniently after the 2012 presidential election. Each of the 18 Democrat signatories voted for or supported Obamacare in the first place. And now they want a sweetheart exemption from one of its most onerous provisions. Even in Washington DC, that shows a lot of gall.

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service on Wednesday released final rules for a new tax on medical devices, products ranging from surgical sutures to knee replacement implants, that starts next year ... ... The tax applies mostly to devices used and implanted by medical professionals, including items as complex as pacemakers or as simple as tongue depressors. Products sold for humanitarian reasons, such as experimental cancer treatment devices, are not exempt from the tax. ... it remains "an open question" when latex gloves come under the tax

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) warns that the Obamacare tax hikes set to kick in at the start of 2013 are "a big part of the fiscal cliff" that will hurt those in need of vital medical equipment. Today, Republican Study Committee Chairman Jim Jordan issued the following statement highlighting the $1.058 trillion in higher taxes coming from ObamaCare over the next ten years. Many of the tax increases take effect on January 1, 2013: "ObamaCare raises taxes on middle-income families, employers and investors. It hikes taxes on people with no health insurance, people with too little insurance and people with...

The Supreme Court decision in June upholding the Affordable Care Act leaves in place a tax on medical devices that threatens thousands of American jobs and our global competitiveness. It will also stifle critical medical innovation in the industry that gave us defibrillators, pacemakers, artificial joints, stents, chemotherapy delivery systems and almost every device we depend on to save lives. The 2.3% tax will be charged to manufacturers on each sale and takes effect in January. Many U.S. device companies, in response, have already announced layoffs, canceled plans for domestic expansion and slashed research-and-development budgets. This month, Welch Allyn—a maker...

Cost-cutting moves by medical device companies have resulted in the loss of more than 2,000 jobs over the past 2 months. Medical device companies are molting at a reptilian rate, shedding more than 2,000 jobs over the past 2 months as they look to slash costs across the board. Several of the med-tech companies that are scrapping jobs say the 2.3% medical device excise tax in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, slated to begin in January 2013. Others deny that the tax is the sole cause of their moves, saying it's a factor but not determinative. Seven medical...

The president’s health care overhaul includes a 2.3 percent excise tax on medical devices that will send the durable medical equipment industry into intensive care, eliminate 43,000 jobs, and whack $3.5 billion from local shops and communities, according to a new study by two free market economists. The 30-page report, released on Wednesday by the Advanced Medical Technology Association, a trade group, also concludes that the tax on medical equipment may prompt the closure of high-tech research facilities in several states. That trade group released its report predicting massive job losses ... The new tax is expected to generate $20...

A computer worm that has alarmed security experts around the world has crawled into hundreds of medical devices at dozens of hospitals in the United States and other countries, according to technologists monitoring the threat. The worm, known as "Conficker," has not harmed any patients, they say, but it poses a potential threat to hospital operations. "A few weeks ago, we discovered medical devices, MRI machines, infected with Conficker," said Marcus Sachs, director of the Internet Storm Center, an early warning system for Internet threats that is operated by the SANS Institute.

Can you imagine what our country would be like if Spitzer was successfull in putting all of his targets out of business? He'd catapult us into the 19th century. A Harvard Medical School study found that doctors implanted more than 2.25 million pacemakers and 400,000 defibrillators in the United States from 1990 to 2002. Malfunctions were directly responsible for just 61 deaths (half from each type of device). While every accidental death is tragic, a fatal error rate of 0.002 percent hardly appears to be the malfeasance these lawsuits suggest. ...Spitzer's solution of (supposedly) "erring on the side of caution"...

Rewiring The Body By Michael Arndt Reed S. Kohn has donated his brain to science. An epileptic since he was 8 years old, Kohn has tried everything from experimental drugs to harrowing surgery to control his seizures. Time and again, neurosurgeons have taken out bits of his brain that spark his hallucinations, or auras, and have severed nerves that enable aberrant electrical impulses to arc from lobe to lobe and generate a full-blown seizure. They have also run filaments to a nerve in his neck and to the core of his brain to microshock the disease into submission. Inevitably,...

For Immediate ReleaseOffice of the Press SecretaryOctober 26, 2002 Radio Address by the President to the Nation      Audio THE PRESIDENT: America's health care system has advantages no other nation can match, but also challenges we cannot ignore. The quality of American medicine is excellent, yet too many Americans live in communities lacking good clinics and basic health care; others are forced to wait for new medical devices that are delayed in an overburdened approval process. And the high cost of prescription drugs is placing a heavy financial burden on many Americans, especially our seniors. This week, we are taking steps...