Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration, on March 9, identified the recall by Medtronic of its TurboHawk Plus Directional Aherectomy System as Class I, the most serious. The recall was initiated because of the risk of the guidewire in the catheter moving downward or prolapsing when force is applied…
Editor's Note OR Manager recently reported on the increased cybersecurity risk the Russia/Ukraine conflict poses to US healthcare systems. With two new malware threats identified last week, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the FBI are urging US organizations and the private sector, including healthcare, to stay vigilant and…
Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on March 3 posted the recall by B. Braun Medical Inc of its nationwide recall of five lots of 0.9% Sodium Chloride for Injection USP 250 ml in Excel. The recall was initiated because of fluid leakage or low fill volume of…
Editor's Note Overall healthcare employment in the US was up in February to a seasonally adjusted 16,184,800 workers, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on March 4. That’s up 63,500 since January. Hospital employment also was up by 2,700 jobs. The overall unemployment rate for February was 3.8%, for a…
Editor's Note On February 23, the American Hospital Association (AHA) released a Cybersecurity Advisory report because of the heightened risk of cyberattacks due to the current Russia-Ukraine conflict. According to AHA, just this past weekend, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the FBI urged the US private sector, including…
Editor's Note According to a February 28 Politico article, titled “Want a COVID-19 vaccine exemption? It can be as easy as copy and paste,” hospital executives are starting to doubt the integrity of religious exemption requests, Becker’s Hospital Review reports. According to the Politico article, submitting a religious exemption is…
Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on February 23 identified the recall by Arrow International (Reading, Pennsylvania), a subsidiary of Teleflex Inc, of its Arrow-Trerotola Percutaneous Thrombolytic Device (PTD) as Class I, the most serious. The recall was initiated because of the risk of tip damage during use…
Editor's Note According to a study in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, COVID-19 increases the risk of and may contribute to new-onset diabetes among children and adolescents, JAMA reports. JAMA’s February 22 article notes that data from previous studies showed an average of 14% of adults hospitalized with COVID-19…
Editor's Note The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on February 23 released the “Maternal Mortality Rates in the United States” report for 2020, after analyzing data from the National Vital Statistics System and calculating mortality rates as the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. The report…
Editor's Note This national study titled, “The Great Collide: The impact of children’s mental health on the workforce,” by researchers at On Our Sleeves finds that the children’s mental health crisis brought to attention by the stresses of the COVID-19 pandemic is having a direct impact on parent’s work performance.…