Philips launches "safer" neonatal blood pressure products
This article was originally published in Clinica
Executive Summary
Philips has launched a new line of neonatal blood pressure products worldwide. The neonatal cuffs and air hoses are designed to prevent misconnections to other medical devices, which can cause death and increase healthcare costs. The connectors in the new products are incompatible with those for other devices such as feeding tubes and catheters, and are also colour-coded and graphically labelled. They comply with neonatal connection regulations that became effective in the EU last December. These are part of a growing focus on patient safety – recently, the World Health Organization identified nine solutions that could be implemented in order to reduce medical errors, which affect one in 10 patients worldwide. Avoiding catheter and tubing misconnections was seventh in the list.