Medical Device Regulation: Going from Bad to Worse...or Better?

Presenter

George Horvath

Date of Event

10-29-2025

Description

The Elena and Miles Zaremski Law Medicine Forum presents: Medical Device Regulation: Going from Bad to Worse...or Better? with George Horvath

Innovations in medical device technology hold the potential to improve health outcomes across the populace. But these same innovations can inflict widespread harm; by some estimates, medical devices caused 1.7 million injuries and 83,000 deaths between 2008 and 2017. Hence, we need for a regulatory system that ensures safety while simultaneously permitting—or ideally, fostering—innovation. Over the past half-century, Congress and the FDA have created a unique and complex regulatory system that seeks to achieve these goals. But according to many critics, this system is far too lax, allowing devices to reach the market without an adequate assessment of safety; others maintain that FDA regulation is stifling innovation and depriving patients of valuable technology.

This talk will focus on some of the perennial shortcomings of medical device regulation, on how the regulatory framework might be altered to achieve its goals, and, in an era of changing administrative priorities and limited agency resources, on how we might begin to move forward.

Lecture Series

Elena and Miles Zaremski Law-Medicine Forum

Location

In Person (Students) and Virtual (Others)

Document Type

Video

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