RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:Longs Just for clarification, I believe the pr meant that if specific scopes are not listed previously as compatible, (see the TSO3 website for a long list), users should ask the manufacturers regarding compatibility. This refers to biocompatibility only, not to the ability of the VP4 to sterilize a particular scope. The FDA has approved the extended claims with an endorsement that a whole new group of complex scopes meeting these lumen numbers, diameters, and lengths can be terminally sterilized by the VP4, (and, only the VP4); but, how many cycles a scope, for example, a scope can go through without requiring servicing of plastic or rubber parts, for example, is a question for the scope manufacturers. And, TSO3 is, of course, as the company has previously stated and made clear on numerous occasions and on their website, open and willing to test any scope or other relevant surgical instrument on the market for biocompatibilty that any company wishes to have tested. TSO3 has set the standard of care with terminal sterilization of complex scopes that competitors simply cannot and will not ever be able to match, and it is up to scope manufacturers to be compatible with this new standard. There may, indeed, be complex scopes beyond the parameters of the extended claims approval that no one will ever be able to terminally sterilize, and these instruments might be regarding as inferior because of this deficiency and eventually become obsolete, as will the Steris and Sterrad low temperature H2O2 units now in widespread use.
Agree very much that a significant impetus for hospitals and other institutions to switch to and upgrade to VP4 will be medical-legal: the lawyers will know very well about the VP4, now. And, Olympus will, as I have suggested, provide their upgraded Q180V duodenoscope to TSO3 very urgently, if they have not done this already, so that TSO3 can show the FDA and the manufacturer that they can provide the terminal sterilization solution to this important offending scope, as well.
As GoPats stated, "Let the games begin!"
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