Life science current events this week include Medtronic hypertension device tops Cleveland Clinic Medical Innovation Summit, Envoy Medical hearing aid video goes viral, and Pozen seeks a partner for its heart drug.

Cleveland Clinic’s 2012 Medical Innovation Summit, this year dedicated to cardiovascular technology, has come and gone.But it’s worth taking a look back at a few observations and insights gleaned from the ninth annual summit — and asking a couple questions.The view from the top is a lot different than the view from the bottom: Given [...]

For health IT startups, there’s opportunity in taking advantage of inevitable changes to the U.S. reimbursement system around telemedicine services, Cleveland Clinic CIO Dr. Martin Harris said at the health system’s Medical Innovation Summit.Soon, tools will be in place to remotely connect doctors to patients 24 hours a day, which should be a great benefit [...]

A Medtronic (NYSE:MDT) device that treats chronic high blood pressure by delivering radio frequency to the kidney has topped Cleveland Clinic‘s list of the Top Medical Innovations for 2012.The device, which Medtronic acquired through its $800 million acquisition of Ardian earlier this year, is called the (pdf) Symplicity Catheter System. It works via a process [...]

Dr. Steven Nissen, chair of Cleveland Clinic’s cardiovascular medicine department, talks about why head-to-head clinical trials of competing drugs and devices would benefit patients.“In medicine, we have many alternative therapies for patients,” he said. “What we need to know to take good care of our patients is which of these therapies is best.”Nissen spoke at [...]

Abbott Vascular’s Ferolyn Powell talks about the company’s MitraClip technology, which is used to treat a common heart valve condition called mitral regurgitation.The MitraClip device is designed to reduce significant mitral regurgitation by clipping together the leaflets of the mitral valve, one of the four valves of the heart.Powell, vice president and general manager of [...]

Cambridge, Massachusetts-based startup MC10‘s conformable electronics allow for stretchable and bendable new form factors for medical devices.In August, the company closed a nearly $15 million series B round of investment led by Braemar Energy Ventures, with participation from North Bridge Venture Partners, Osage University Partners, Windham Venture Partners and Terawatt Ventures.In an interview at the [...]

Any new products introduced by medical device companies must not only have clinical value, but they must deliver economic value to customers, Medtronic (NYSE:MDT) CEO Omar Ishrak said at the Cleveland Clinic Medical Innovation Summit.“Technology without a sense of the cost-effectiveness of that technology is not sustainable,” Ishrak said.For Medtronic, that means thinking about how [...]

The initial public offerings market has been slow going for medical device companies in recent years, and it isn’t likely to pick up anytime soon.While the IPO market won’t be completely dead, “companies that I speak with aren’t thinking about IPOs in the near term,” said Jason Mills, managing director of medical devices equity research [...]

Colin Drummond of Case Western Reserve University’s department of biomedical engineering discussed a few of the most promising medical technology spinoff companies from the university.As director of the Coulter-Case Translational Research Partnership, Drummond is behind a $1 million fund that often invests in technologies spun out of Case.Drummond discusses a few spinoff companies, including next-generation [...]