I recently signed up to the MHRA’s alerts emails and this one has me a little bit confused. It was ‘issued’ on Friday 17 May but references a document (Field Safety Notice) from March 2013, so perhaps it’s more of an update than a new thing. Anyway…

Medtronic pumps affected:
Paradigm ambulatory insulin infusion pumps.
Models: MMT – 511, 512, 712, 712E, 515, 715, 522, 722, 722K, 523, 723, 723K, 554 (VEO) and 754 (VEO).

Medical Device Alert: Paradigm ambulatory insulin infusion pumps manufactured by Medtronic (MDA/2013/035)
Note that there are tabs with different bits of information about the Device | Problem | Action | Distribution | Contacts and Feedback

The Distribution tag intrigued me – it’s a list of NHS and related departments / divisions / organisations to which this alert is communicated. The audience is primarily healthcare professionals but I am a little bit surprised that these things aren’t communicated to patient support groups as from the picture of the pump it seems like something a person with diabetes would use at home (perhaps I am wrong, perhaps these are only ever used in a hospital setting?) so why not use other means to tell them? Obviously healthcare professionals can contact their patients and distribute the info as needed, but I don’t see why a bit of redundancy can’t be built in here. Belts and braces 🙂