THURSDAY, July 31, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- In a letter that was to be sent to all of its customers Thursday, Johnson & Johnson asked that its laparoscopic power morcellators be returned to the company, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Sales of new morcellators had been suspended in April after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration warned that doctors should not use the tool because of the potential risk of spreading cancer during minimally invasive surgeries to remove uterine fibroids or the uterus itself.
The morcellator used a spinning power cutter to slice uterine tissue into smaller fragments. Those fragments were then removed through small incisions in the abdomen via a tube or laparoscope. Experts said the company's decision sends a strong message.
"The bottom line is that it looks like the sarcoma risk is much higher than we originally thought," Steven McCarus, M.D., chief of gynecological surgery at Florida Hospital Celebration Health, which was one of the chief Johnson & Johnson training sites for the morcellator device, told the WSJ. The hospital suspended its use of power morcellators after the April FDA advisory, the newspaper reported.
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