Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on June 8 identified the recall by Medtronic of its HeartWare Ventricular Assist Device (HVAD) Pump Implant Kit as Class I, the most serious. The HVAD System is used as a bridge to cardiac transplants. The Kit was recalled because of a…
Editor's Note This study from Spring Health, New York City, and Yale University, New Haven Connecticut, finds that an employer-sponsored mental health benefit was associated with reduced symptoms for employees and positive financial return on investment (ROI) for employers. This cohort study included 1,132 employees participating in a workplace mental…
Editor's Note US Representatives Madeleine Dean (D-Pa) and Larry Bucshon, MD, (R-Ind) on June 7 introduced a Bill to protect healthcare workers (HCWs) from violence that is modeled after protections for airline workers, the June 8 Becker’s Hospital Review reports. The Safety from Violence for Healthcare Employees Act would criminalize…
Editor's Note According to an analysis by Derek Horstmeyer, PhD, finance professor at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, healthcare stocks generally see the “worst median annualized returns during inflation spikes,” Becker’s Hospital CFO Report June 8 reports. Horstmeyer’s analysis, first published in the Wall Street Journal on June 5,…
Editor's Note This Israeli study finds that individuals previously infected with COVID-19, regardless of whether they had been vaccinated, had more protection against reinfection than those who were vaccinated (Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine) but previously uninfected. Among the findings for the number of COVID-19 cases per 100,000 person days since vaccination or…
Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration on June 3 identified the recall by Philips Respironics of all V60 and V60 Plus Ventilators as Class I, the most serious. The recall was initiated because an internal power fluctuation may cause the ventilator to shut down unintentionally with or without any…
Editor's Note In a JAMA Internal Medicine study involving more than 7,000 COVID-19 patients, titled “Racial and Ethnic Discrepancy in Pulse Oximetry and Delayed Identification of Treatment Eligibility Among Patients With COVID-19” and published in May 2022, researchers found that pulse oximetry, which measures blood oxygen saturation levels and is…
Editor's Note This study, led by researchers at IQVIA, Durham, North Carolina, finds that in a young, healthy, highly vaccinated cohort of players and staff in the National Basketball Association (NBA), booster vaccinations were associated with a significant reduction in COVID-19 infections during the Omicron wave. Of 2,613 players and…
Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on June 2 identified the recall by Atrium Medical Corporation of its iCast Covered Stent System as Class I, the most serious. The recall was initiated because of increased complaints about the separation of the balloon or catheter hub from the delivery…
Editor's Note According to a report from cybersecurity firm Sophos, titled “The State of Ransomware in Healthcare 2022” and published in May 2022, ransomware attacks on healthcare organizations have increased by 94% “year over year” globally, Becker’s Health IT June 6 reports. The report includes findings from an “independent, vendor-agnostic…