Note: This report originally appeared in the August 2008 edition of DOTmed Business News. A list of registered users that provide sales & service can be found at the end. Read an exclusive briefing from leading manufacturers on smart pump technology at https://www.dotmed.com/news/story/6506/

With the number of beds in U.S. hospitals topping 947,000 - and an estimated 70 percent of them equipped with infusion pumps - there's plenty of business to go around for companies that sell and service new and used equipment.

The long- and short-term trends in the market also favor these devices, even though infusion and medical pumps are somewhat taken for granted.
"People think of pumps as commodities," laments Eric Melanson, Director of Marketing, Infusion Systems, B. Braun Medical Inc., Bethlehem, PA. "I had a [hospital] CFO tell me he viewed buying pumps like a maintenance contract on the
elevator. 'I have to have an elevator; I have to have pumps.' They didn't want to attribute high value to [pumps] and wanted to negotiate and buy them as commodities."




Fortunately for the manufacturers, their new "smart pump" designs are bringing new functionality - and respect - to these devices. "Smart pumps are like a shot of adrenaline into our products and have fostered new features," Melanson says.

The new smart pumps, which often offer wireless convenience, don't just deliver medication at a controlled rate. They can also store a hospital's entire drug library, with concentrations and dose limits. The pump tells the nurse when limits - defined for each care unit such as OR, ICU, etc. - are exceeded. "[Smart pumps] have been a major impetus for hospitals to throw out their old pumps, which did not have these safety features," he says.

What exactly is a "smart pump?" "It means different things to different people," says Kevin Franklin, Senior Product Manager, Smiths Medical, St. Paul, MN. "A smart system is really a pump with medication safety software. The software makes it smart, not the wireless communication capability, which is an efficiency issue."




He noted that smart pumps can have clinical benefits with or without connectivity to a wireless hospital network to speed programming. "We sell smart pumps to hospitals that are not wireless; they can still benefit without question."

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