GE Healthcare Partners With Masimo to Incorporate rainbow® SET Technology With GE Patient Monitors

MILWAUKEE and IRVINE, Calif., Feb. 23, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- GE Healthcare and Masimo (NASDAQ: MASI) jointly announced a long-term agreement under which GE will incorporate Masimo rainbow® SET technology into many of GE Healthcare's patient monitoring products.

"Combining Masimo's measurements advances with our innovative patient monitors enhances bedside clinical decision-making and ultimately, supports patient care," said Matthias Weber, General Manager of Monitoring Solutions at GE Healthcare. "Through our focused Monitoring Solutions division, GE Healthcare is committed to optimally collecting information from the patient's body, and transforming it into meaningful intelligence for caregivers. Masimo's suite of noninvasive and continuous rainbow® SET measurements will further enhance the point-of-care clinical intelligence benefits already offered in GE Healthcare's patient monitors."

Masimo rainbow® SET noninvasive and continuous measurements—including total hemoglobin (SpHb®), oxygen content (SpOC™), carboxyhemoglobin (SpCO®), methemoglobin (SpMet®), and Pleth Variability Index (PVI®), in addition to the Measure-Through Motion and Low Perfusion performance of Masimo SET® oxyhemoglobin (SpO2), perfusion index (PI), and pulse rate (PR)—provide additional physiological data at the point-of-care that can help clinicians assess patients and detect adverse conditions much earlier.  These measurements help caregivers identify conditions such as low levels of blood oxygen, hemoglobin, and/or perfusion, as well as elevated levels of carbon monoxide and methemoglobin in the blood, abnormal pulse rates, and fluid responsiveness. With rainbow® SET, the ability to noninvasively detect and continuously monitor changes quickly and easily may help save lives and improve patient outcomes.

According to Masimo President of Worldwide OEM Business & Corporate Development, Rick Fishel, "GE Healthcare's patient monitoring lines have a long history of innovative clinical measurements and system solutions that enhance patient care decisions.  We are excited to announce this expansion of our partnership with GE Healthcare and are proud to work with them to incorporate rainbow SET measurements in their monitoring solutions to continue this tradition for the benefit of customers and the patients they serve."

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 around the world. Headquartered in the United Kingdom, GE Healthcare is a unit of General Electric Company (NYSE: GE). Worldwide, GE Healthcare employees are 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.  For our latest news, please visit http://newsroom.gehealthcare.com

About Masimo
Masimo (NASDAQ: MASI) is the global leader in innovative noninvasive monitoring technologies that significantly improve patient care—helping solve "unsolvable" problems.  In 1995, the company debuted Measure-Through Motion and Low Perfusion pulse oximetry, known as Masimo SET®, which virtually eliminated false alarms and increased pulse oximetry's ability to detect life-threatening events.  More than 100 independent and objective studies demonstrate Masimo SET provides the most reliable SpO2 and pulse rate measurements even under the most challenging clinical conditions, including patient motion and low peripheral perfusion.  In 2005, Masimo introduced rainbow SET® Pulse CO-Oximetry^TM technology, allowing noninvasive and continuous monitoring of blood constituents that previously required invasive procedures, including total hemoglobin (SpHb®), oxygen content (SpOC^™), carboxyhemoglobin (SpCO®), methemoglobin (SpMet®), and Pleth Variability Index (PVI®), in addition to SpO2, pulse rate, and perfusion index (PI).  In 2008, Masimo introduced Patient SafetyNet™, a remote monitoring and wireless clinician notification system designed to help hospitals avoid preventable deaths and injuries associated with failure to rescue events.  In 2009, Masimo introduced rainbow Acoustic Monitoring™, the first-ever noninvasive and continuous monitoring of acoustic respiration rate (RRa™).  Masimo's rainbow SET technology platform offers a breakthrough in patient safety by helping clinicians detect life-threatening conditions and helping guide treatment options.  In 2010, Masimo acquired SEDLine®, a pioneer in the development of innovative brain function monitoring technology and devices.  Masimo SET and Masimo rainbow SET technologies can be also found in over 100 multiparameter patient monitors from over 50 medical device manufacturers around the world.  Founded in 1989, Masimo has the mission of "Improving Patient Outcome and Reducing Cost of Care … by Taking Noninvasive Monitoring to New Sites and Applications®." Additional information about Masimo and its products may be found at www.masimo.com.

Forward-Looking Statements
This press release includes forward-looking statements as defined in Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, in connection with the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are based on current expectations about future events affecting us and are subject to risks and uncertainties, all of which are difficult to predict and many of which are beyond our control and could cause our actual results to differ materially and adversely from those expressed in our forward-looking statements as a result of various risk factors, including, but not limited to:  risks related to our assumptions of the repeatability of clinical results, risks related to our belief that the integration of Masimo rainbow SET into GE patient monitoring devices will help improve patient care and save lives, as well as other factors discussed in the "Risk Factors" section of our most recent reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC"), which may be obtained for free at the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. Although we believe that the expectations reflected in our forward-looking statements are reasonable, we do not know whether our expectations will prove correct. All forward-looking statements included in this press release are expressly qualified in their entirety by the foregoing cautionary statements. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of today's date. We do not undertake any obligation to update, amend or clarify these statements or the "Risk Factors" contained in our most recent reports filed with the SEC, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be required under the applicable securities laws.

Masimo, SET, Signal Extraction Technology, Improving Patient Outcome and Reducing Cost of Care… by Taking Noninvasive Monitoring to New Sites and Applications, rainbow, SpHb, SpOC, SpCO, SpMet, PVI, rainbow Acoustic Monitoring, RRa, Radical-7, Rad-87, Rad-57,Rad-8, Rad-5,Pulse CO-Oximetry, Pulse CO-Oximeter, Adaptive Threshold Alarm, and SEDLine  are trademarks or registered trademarks of Masimo Corporation. The use of the trademarks Patient SafetyNet and PSN are under license from University HealthSystem Consortium.

SOURCE Masimo Corporation