A newly formed University of Illinois spinoff company could be on to something good with a new drug treatment for cancer that targets an enzyme commonly found in various tumor types.Department of Chemistry professor Paul Hergenrother and a handful of other co-founders of Vanquish Oncology are developing compounds that selectively kill cancer cells by targeting [...]

A Chicago biopharmaceutical company developing new ways to treat pain, epilepsy and other nervous system disorders is following up a $43 million series B round of funding in 2010 with another round of up to $47.5 million.NeuroTherapeutics Pharma Inc. is developing a new class of medicines for neurological and neuropsychiatric conditions that includes its lead [...]

Hospira (NYSE:HSP) completed a two-year “restructuring and optimization plan” this year that the company expressly stated would increase shareholder value by generating annualized savings between $110 million and $140 million. But now the company faces a phalanx of angry shareholders claiming the company did not disclose the extent of problems at a North Carolina plant [...]

Hospira (NYSE:HSP) plans to spend up to $375 million over the next three years to bring its manufacturing facilities into regulatory compliance, the bulk of it going to a North Carolina plant saddled under heavy regulatory scrutiny for much of the last two years.The effort is under way with a hiring blitz over the next [...]

The Occupy Wall Street protests continued in Chicago and the nurses unions are dispensing a new form of “first aid:”Outraged by the arrest of two nurses and a union organizer volunteering at the Occupy Chicago protest over the weekend, National Nurses United is planning a protest at Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office Monday.The group, the nation’s [...]

The entire US Defense budget for 2010: $685.1 BillionIn 2009, the United States federal, state and local governments, corporations and individuals, together spent $2.5 trillion, $8,047 per person, on health care. This amount represented 17.3% of the GDP, up from 16.2% in 2008 and health insurance costs are rising faster than wages or inflation.Even if every sword was beat into scalpels, it wouldn’t begin to pay for America’s exploding health care bill. Worse, with our new health care reform law, the same old construct for health care delivery remains: burgenoning middle-man costs, pandering to special interests, and endless consumer expectations.

A surgical imaging spinoff from the University of Illinois has raised $1.3 million in equity, according to a regulatory filing.Chicago-based Diagnostic Photonics sourced the funding from seven investors, likely including IllinoisVentures, a seed and early stage investment firm launched by the University of Illinois.CEO Andrew Cittadine didn’t return a call.var page_count = “off”; [...]

A surgical tool company focused on innovative wound care is raising fresh capital.The Chicago-based Surgimatix is developing a new medical device that would close wounds and supplant all types of sutures. It would work to heal the wound quickly but with with less scarring than surgical staples.The company has started raising up to $500,000, according [...]

An Illinois company developing a way to stop superbugs like MRSA is raising capital that would take it into earliest stages of the drug approval process.ImmuVen is developing a line of T cell receptor-related drugs. At first, the treatment will focus on infectious viral diseases such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), which ImmuVen says it [...]

Baxter International Inc. (NYSE:BAX) put aside $200 million in equity to invest in early-stage companies that “complement” its portfolio.The newly established ” Baxter Ventures will invest globally and focus on innovative technologies with sustainable long-term growth” under the watch of the Deerfield, Ill.-based company’s chief scientific officer Norbert Riedel, according to [...]