Here are some of the top stories at MedCity News this week:
— The artificial pancreas just got a brain. Medtronic Inc. (NYSE:MDT) said Monday the Food and Drug Administration has approved software that helps manage a patient’s diabetes therapy. Medtronic’s CareLink 3.0 software analyzes data from a patient’s insulin pump, continuous glucose monitoring device, and blood glucose meter and identifies the exact times the patient experiences a low (hypoglycemic) or high (hyperglycemic) glucose pattern.
— When you’re the president and CEO of a major national real estate development firm, it’s probably not a good idea to make insulting online comments to a reporter — especially when it’s the first time you’ve spoken publicly about the troubled Elk Run BioBusiness Park in Pine Island, Minnesota. Yet that’s exactly what Steve Marks, CEO of Tower Investments in California did upon reading Thomas Lee’s Tuesday story about the economic development project.
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— And here’s the story on which Marks commented: “There are two things that we know about the universe,” Abraham Algadi said. “We can only control the things we can control. The rest, we leave to a higher power.” Algadi is not a priest or philosopher, at least professionally. Algadi, the city administrator for Pine Island, Minnesota, was referring to the fate of the much maligned, often delayed Elk Run BioBusiness Park.
— Longtime medical device industry champions Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken along with Rep. Erik Paulsen have kicked up their 510(k) campaign a notch. With the FDA close to releasing its recommendations on the regulation for approving new medical devices, a bipartisan group of 15 senators sent a letter to FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg urging her agency, among other things, to adopt a deliberate, cautious approach to amending 510(k).
— It was inevitable that healthcare would suffer cuts in the face of Ohio’s crushing $8 billion budget deficit, and state Republicans look likely to put Medicaid eligibility on the chopping block. A supposedly bipartisan committee of Ohio lawmakers was tasked with coming up with ways to relieve the state’s looming budget deficit, yet the committee issued two reports: one from Republicans and one from Democrats. Since the GOP will take control of the governorship and both the Senate and House next year, it’s highly likely that the Republican budget-cutting plan will receive much more serious consideration.