BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, GE Healthcare, a unit of General Electric Company announced new and expanded collaborations with three separate medical technology companies to enhance their electrophysiology (EP) portfolio and clinically relevant solutions. The synergies and integration between GE interventional products and their partners' medical products will be presented at Heart Rhythm 2009, May 13-16, in Boston, Mass, Booth 1403. The partner companies include: Hansen Medical Inc., STERIS® Corporation and Imricor Medical Systems, Inc.

According to Jayant Saha, GE Healthcare's General Manager of Product Marketing for the Interventional business unit, the partnerships have strong, positive implications for both GE (EP) customers and their patients. "We have partnered with some truly innovative companies that will support GE's commitment to EP, " said Saha. "The incorporation of these products with GE technology provides the industry with exciting answers for information access, enhancing quality and integration with clinical tools to provide clinically relevant solutions. Access, quality and cost combined help provide today's healthcare giver with greater practice efficiency."


Compatibility to improve EP workflow
GE and Hansen began working together last fall to try and improve workflow in the EP lab. Based in Mountain View, Calif., Hansen Medical, Inc., (Nasdaq: HNSN) develops products and technology using robotics for the accurate positioning, manipulation and control of catheters and catheter-based technologies. The agreement expands their association to pursue integration of products for the treatment of arrhythmias. The agreement also includes the intent to integrate the Sensei™ robotic catheter system with GE's Innova™ EP X-ray imaging system. The compatibility of the two products was announced in late 2008.

Hansen Medical's Sensei® Robotic Catheter System is a robotic navigation system that enables clinicians to place mapping catheters in hard-to-reach anatomical locations within the heart easily, accurately and with stability during complex cardiac arrhythmia procedures. GE's Innova is one of the world's most trusted families of all-digital EP & cardiovascular imaging systems. The Innova X-ray imaging system provides users with excellent image quality with excellent dose efficiency. Built on GE's innovative digital detector, the Innova System helps physicians perform complex electrophysiology procedures, precisely place ICDs and successfully perform critical maneuvers. The system is designed to help provide electrophysiologists with more information, resulting in better diagnosis and treatment of complex cardiac arrhythmias


Customizing the EP Lab
GE is now collaborating with STERIS Corporation, a leading provider of infection prevention and surgical technologies and services for the healthcare, pharmaceutical and research markets, to provide LED lighting, jointly designed EP cockpit and cable management solutions. In addition, STERIS brings years of project design management expertise and its proprietary 3-D room design capabilities to the EP planning process. STERIS and GE consultants are using these animated virtual reality renderings to help design and optimize the physical layout of a hospital's EP lab and to increase efficiency and save space within the interventional suite.


Helping Develop the EP system of the future
Imricor Medical Systems Inc. develops magnetic resonance- (MR) guided ablation catheters and associated systems, based on patents licensed from Johns Hopkins University. Though the agreement, GE and Imricor intend to co-develop a radiation-free cardiac EP system. The resulting system would likely combine GE's MR platform and CardioLab® recording system, as well as Imricor's Vision® ablation catheters and Bridge® guidance systems. The point of the collaboration is to provide a truly innovative MR-guided, catheter-based cardiac EP technique that may lower procedure time and help eliminate ionizing radiation exposure for patients and clinicians.

"GE Healthcare has initiated these alliances to provide tools for a tailored EP suite and also to help increase productivity," says Saha. "We are proud to showcase such strong allies in the EP healthcare arena."


About Hansen Medical, Inc.
Hansen Medical Inc., based in Mountain View, Calif., develops products and technology using robotics for the accurate positioning, manipulation and control of catheters and catheter-based technologies. Its first product, the Sensei(R) Robotic Catheter system, is a robotic navigation system that enables clinicians to place mapping catheters in hard-to-reach anatomical locations within the heart easily, accurately and with stability during complex cardiac arrhythmia procedures. The Sensei system is compatible with fluoroscopy, ultrasound, 3D surface map and patient electrocardiogram data and was cleared by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in May 2007 for manipulation and control of certain mapping catheters in Electrophysiology (EP) procedures. The safety and effectiveness of the Sensei system for use with cardiac ablation catheters in the treatment of cardiac arrhythmias, including atrial fibrillation (AF), have not been established. In the European Union, the Sensei system is cleared for use during EP procedures, such as guiding catheters in the treatment of AF. Additional information can be found at www.hansenmedical.com.

About STERIS Corporation
STERIS Corporation is a leading provider of infection prevention and surgical products and services, focused primarily on critical healthcare, pharmaceutical and research markets. The Company's more than 5,000 dedicated employees around the world work together to supply a broad array of solutions by offering a combination of equipment, consumables and services that enhance Customer productivity and quality, and help make the world a safer place. The Company is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol STE. For more information, visit www.steris.com.

About Imricor Medical Systems
Imricor Medical Systems Inc. is a privately held company located in Burnsville, MN. It was founded in 2006 to develop MR guided ablation catheters and associated systems, based on patents exclusively licensed from the Johns Hopkins University. Imricor's patents cover technology that makes MR guided cardiac ablation possible, as well as the medical procedure itself. For more information, please go to: www.imricor.com.

About GE Healthcare
GE Healthcare provides transformational medical technologies and services that are shaping a new age of patient care. Our broad expertise in medical imaging and information technologies, medical diagnostics, patient monitoring systems, drug discovery, biopharmaceutical manufacturing technologies, performance improvement and performance solutions services help our customers to deliver better care to more people around the world at a lower cost. In addition, we partner with healthcare leaders, striving to leverage the global policy change necessary to implement a successful shift to sustainable healthcare systems.

Our "healthymagination" vision for the future invites the world to join us on our journey as we continuously develop innovations focused on reducing costs, increasing access and improving quality and efficiency around the world. Headquartered in the United Kingdom, GE Healthcare is a $17 billion unit of General Electric Company (NYSE: GE). Worldwide, GE Healthcare employs more than 46,000 people committed to serving healthcare professionals and their patients in more than 100 countries. For more information about GE Healthcare, visit our website at www.gehealthcare.com