Abbott Laboratories, which acquired Minnesota medical device maker St. Jude Medical last month, is halting use of a commercially promising blood pump in the U.S. and Europe following a patient death and several malfunctions.
The device at issue, the HeartMate PHP catheter, consists of a propeller inside a thin wire cage that is inserted in the heart to keep blood flowing at a predictable rate during a procedure to unblock clogged blood vessels.
