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Here are some news/notes from a day in MedCity, Minnesota:
The University of Minnesota has been awarded an $8.6 million grant to speed the development of novel stem cell and immune cell-based therapies from the laboratory to clinical trials. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), part of the National Institutes of Health, selected the school to create new treatments for patients with various heart, lung, and blood diseases.
With the Rise of AI, What IP Disputes in Healthcare Are Likely to Emerge?
Munck Wilson Mandala Partner Greg Howison shared his perspective on some of the legal ramifications around AI, IP, connected devices and the data they generate, in response to emailed questions.
Gov. Tim Pawlenty said Thursday that he will veto a bill passed by the Legislature just hours earlier, with broad bipartisan support, that temporarily continues a state-financed health insurance plan that each month covers about 35,000 of the state’s poorest, sickest adults, according to the Star Tribune in Minneapolis. The bill to extend General Assistance Medical Care (GAMC) for 16 months passed the House 125-9. The Senate, which had approved a slightly different version last week, quickly passed the House version 47-16. The governor’s veto, Thursday night or Friday, will set up an attempt by the DFL-controlled Legislature to override it.
CryoLife Inc. may engage in a proxy fight to take over Brooklyn Center-based medtech Medafor Inc. after Medafor rejected Kennesaw, Ga.-based CryoLife’s initial $40 million offer for company, according to the Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal. In a letter to Medafor’s board of directors released Wednesday, CryoLife’s chairman, president and CEO Steven Anderson said his company would “consider all options available to us, including our right to call a special meeting of shareholders … or proceed with a proxy contest to replace at least a majority of the Medafor directors.”
Endovascular device maker ev3 Inc. swung to a quarterly profit, helped by higher sales at its peripheral vascular and neurovascular businesses and lower expenses, and forecast first-quarter earnings above analyst estimates, according to Reuters. For the latest fourth quarter, net income was $13.0 million, or 12 cents a share, compared with a net loss of $291.1 million, or $2.78 a share, in the year-ago period.
A nursing home resident in central Minnesota died of pneumonia days after three nurses failed to properly respond to the man’s chest tightness and other warning signs, according to the Star Tribune in Minneapolis. The facility, the Foley Nursing Center, was cited by the Health Department in its report for not having “an adequate system in place whereby nurses notified the physician of the resident’s deteriorating health status.”
A Personalized Approach to Medication Nonadherence
At the Abarca Forward conference earlier this year, George Van Antwerp, managing director at Deloitte, discussed how social determinants of health and a personalized member experience can improve medication adherence and health outcomes.
Medtronic Inc. said today its board of directors approved a cash dividend of $0.205 per share, payable April 30.
The University of the Minnesota Medical School is changing how its students learn one of their more nerve-racking lessons, the pelvic exam, according to the Associated Press. Historically, the students have practiced on paid demonstrators but the university has recently switched to mannequins in an effort to save money.
A wrongful death lawsuit has been filed against Mayo Clinic, which was caring for a man who killed himself last year by jumping off a nearby parking ramp, according to Post-Bulletin in Rochester. Heather J. Harms, widow and next of kin for Kevin D. Harms, brought the lawsuit, filed in Olmsted District Court, against the clinic. Kevin Harms was being treated for depression at the time of his death. He had walked away from the hospital shortly before his death.
Rebecca Berman, a vice president of new therapies and diagnostics in Medtronic’s Cardiac Rhythm Disease Management business, was among 68 members elected to the National Academy of Engineering, part of the prestigious National Academies, according to the Star Tribune in Minneapolis.
