Abbott Laboratories recalls millions of Diabetes testing strips

December 23rd, 2010 - 8:48 pm ICT by Aishwarya Bhatt  

Washington, Dec 23 (THAINDIAN NEWS) Abbott Laboratories has announced that it is recalling more than 359 million copies of its diabetes testing strips.

The company announced that the recall was due to safety hazards associated with those strips. However the real reason might be inaccurate readings of the strips. According to the information available, the strip can give a dangerously inaccurate reading.

The company managed to realize the defect during a routine internal review. During the review, the company realized that some of the strips were taking exceptionally longer time to absorb the blood sample from a patient’s finger. The company said that that can lead to inaccurate reading of the patient’s sugar level.

The recall statement said that all the defective strips should be returned to the point of purchase for replacement. There will not be any additional cost to the replacement.

Inaccurate reading can be very dangerous for diabetic patients. False result can make them increase or decrease their sugar levels which in any case can be fatal.

The head of FDA’s Office of In Vitro Diagnostics, Alberto Gutierrez said that, “FDA and Abbott are reviewing the cause of the manufacturing defect to avoid this problem in the future.”

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