Syringe
An antique syringe on display at the Dittrick Museum in Cleveland [Image by assistant editor Danielle Kirsh]
As with the stethoscope, the hypodermic syringe enabled physicians to draw blood from patients, as well as inject drugs into them, without causing permanent injury. Initially used to deliver morphine to kill pain, they’ve been the delivery vehicle of countless life-saving substances — including insulin after its role in diabetes was discovered in the 1920s.
More than 100 years later, Spanish inventor Manuel Jalón Corominas created the auto-disposable needle-syringe, which was pivotal to reducing the spread of AIDS and other transmitted diseases because the needle became detachable from the syringe after use.
Hypodermic syringes are arguably a good example of how an already available technology can become disruptive thanks to new innovations. Syringes, after all, has been around since the time of the Roman Empire, according to a Wikipedia article about syringes.
Little credit to Dr. Frederic Foley who in the early 1930 some 30 years prior to Dr. Thomas Fogarty placed a balloon on an indwelling urethtal catheter. Confident any work by Dr. Fogarty probably involved a review of a Foley catheter as he began working on his catheter. Actually CR Bard began distributing the Foley catheter in the 1930 as well. Although Paul Raiche with the David Rubber company was awarded the Patent for the device the World would only know the product as The Foley… over 200million are utilized annually.
For a follow up article it would be interesting to track reimbursement policies and medical innovations. Since these policy can “push” innovation. At Poiesis this is why we launched the Duette catheter to reduce CAUTI events. CMS does not pay for never events so we designed a device that lowers rates 13:1 so far over the single balloon Foley. At $11,419 cost per infection it’s a game changer, only brought to the market due to reimbursement policies.
Appreciate the look back, alway good to know the past.
That’s a good point about Dr. Foley, Greg. Fogarty’s work, it seems, was such a game-changer because he figured out how to make balloon catheter work in the vasculature. Surgeons not having to dig around looking for a blood clot — it was a big deal. … That’s interesting about how reimbursement policies enabled the launch of your catheter. Think we’ll see more innovation like this, since CMS is driving toward alternative payment models post-Obamacare?
Certainly these are all game changers, although the first few were probably the biggest game changers ever. Certainly this is a relevant collection of major accomplishments. Thanks for publishing it!!