The US Medicare agency granted inpatient new-technology add-on payments for Boston Scientific's newly acquired cerebral protection system for TAVR, Respicardia's neurostimulator for sleep apnea and Procept BioRobotics' novel resection system for benign prostatic hyperplasia. The highly selective bonus payments typically help drive adoption for the chosen new technologies.

While the US Medicare agency is proposing to end hospital inpatient new-technology add-on payments for Edwards Lifesciences’ and LivaNova’s minimally surgical valves, and for WL Gore's endoprosthesis aneurysm device, it is evaluating possible bonus payments for 7 more devices beginning Oct. 1.

This month's edition of Device Debuts includes new product launches from Medtronic, Cochlear, Qualcomm, Titan Spine, Stryker, Philips, Nuance, Nevro, Siemens, Vortex BioSciences, ResMed, Respircardia, and others.

Starts & Stops is a regular feature highlighting Medtech Insight editors' picks of noteworthy medtech clinical trial initiations, completions and suspensions over the past month. This edition takes a closer look at Respicardia, which has cut short the post-approval study of its implantable sleep apnea device study.