The FINANCIAL — Panasonic announced on November 14 that the company will showcase its new innovative tool for personalized preventive medicine, the CardioHealth Station, at booth number 1831 at the 2010 American Heart Association Scientific Sessions to be held in Chicago from November 14 – November 17.
The CardioHealth Station, Panasonic’s flagship healthcare product, will be on display and demonstrated on the show floor. The CardioHealth Station is designed to assist medical professionals in making a quick and valuable assessment of cardiovascular health and is expected to launch in North America pending FDA action.
"The CardioHealth Station has a built-in portable ultrasound system optimized to perform a non-invasive examination of the carotid arteries. It provides an automated real-time measurement of the intima-media thickness (IMT) and allows the user to search for arterial plaques. Moreover, the touch-screen keyboard allows the user to input various parameters related to traditional cardiovascular risk factors. A built in calculator provides risk scores commonly used in a variety of medical environments (Framingham Risk Score, PROCAM Health Check Score, Reynolds Risk Score, Risk score based on the SCORE Project). This information is supplemented with an IMT measurement of the artery to generate a comprehensive report to aid the physician in assessing cardiovascular risk," Panasonic reported.
Recently published studies sponsored by the US National Institute of Health (ARIC and MESA) have shown that there is valuable information revealed in the assessment of vascular health, and the risks of a cardiovascular event associated with those assessments. The ARIC*2 study, a 15-year multi-institution study, revealed that certain patients can be reclassified from “Low or Intermediate Risk” to “High Risk” by looking at the carotid-intima media thickness and the presence of plaque in the patient. Panasonic developed CardioHealth Station, a much needed device that will enable rapid detection of thick carotid arteries . The carotid artery is the blood vessel branch that goes from the heart up the neck, and provides blood to the front of the face and the brain. What once used to be difficult and impractical to do on a mass basis is now made possible by the innovative automation technology loaded as standard in the CardioHealth Station.
“Panasonic plans to take a leadership role in the field of Personalized Preventive Medicine,” said Joseph M. Taylor, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Panasonic Corporation of North America. “The CardioHealth Station is an innovative example of how Panasonic is planning to work closely with the medical community to provide the tools to assist the practitioner in achieving the goal of lowering healthcare costs through the early detection of disease.”
In May, the president of Panasonic Corporation, Fumio Ohtsubo stated Panasonic’s worldwide intention to reinforce the healthcare business and announced the plan to change its subsidiary’s name from Panasonic Shikoku Electronics Co.,Ltd to Panasonic Healthcare Co., Ltd on October 1, 2010. On October 25, Panasonic Corporation of North America announced the formation of CardioNexus Corporation, which became the launching platform for CardioHealth Station in North America on November 14th. Panasonic is currently applying for FDA approval of the CardioHealth Station, and expects sales to begin as soon as approval is received from the regulatory authorities.
“Helping the world reduce global healthcare costs is in everybody’s interest,” said Osamu Takahashi, the Director of Global Strategy at Panasonic Healthcare Co., Ltd. “Panasonic believes the CardioHealth Station, a first in a series of products – will help achieve the corporate goal of improving society through the early detection of disease.”
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