SurgiCount Medical Announces The Appointment Of Michael Roux As Vice President of Product Management

IRVINE, Calif., March 11, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- SurgiCount Medical, Inc., the wholly owned operating subsidiary of Patient Safety Technologies, Inc. (OTCBB:PSTX), today announced that Michael Roux has joined the Company in the position of Vice President of Product Management.  Mr. Roux will oversee the development and management of SurgiCount Medical's product offerings, including the company's existing solution for retained sponge prevention, the Safety-Sponge^® System, as well as the expansion into additional patient safety and cost reduction products solutions.

Mr. Roux joins SurgiCount from Hill-Rom where he was the Global Product Director for the Respiratory Care franchise.  During his tenure at Hill-Rom, he focused on developing and commercializing medical device and service solutions for the Chronic and Acute Care Respiratory markets.  He was also responsible for the overall global leadership of strategic and downstream marketing efforts, clinical education, sales training, and clinical research. 

Previously, Mr. Roux was with 3M Company for 19 years, holding positions of increasing responsibility within engineering, six-sigma, global product marketing leadership and business development.  His breadth of health care experience includes managing a variety of global product portfolios of surgical products.

Mr. Roux holds a Bachelor of Industrial Engineering Degree from the University of Minnesota, and a Masters of Business Administration, Marketing from the University of St. Thomas.

"We are excited to add Michael's depth of experience to our team and are confident he will help us continue to improve our market leading retained sponge solution as well as accelerate our efforts to provide our users new products and solutions to enable them to further improve their patient outcomes and reduce their costs of care," stated Brian E. Stewart, President and Chief Executive Officer.

Surgical Adverse Events and Retained Surgical Sponges
Surgical never events are costly to the health care system and are associated with serious harm to patients¹.  Retained foreign bodies are estimated to represent up to 49.8% of all reported surgical never events¹ with surgical sponges representing the vast majority of items unintentionally retained².  Estimated to occur as often as 1 in every 1,000 to 1,500 abdominal operations to 1 in every 8,000 in patient operations², with an estimated 32 million surgical procedures annually in the U.S. this implies approximately 4,000 retained sponge incidents each year, 11 every day.  The negative impact to patient outcomes from retained foreign objects varies and can be significant, with permanent injuries in an estimated 16% of incidents and patient mortality in 5%¹.  Cost ramifications can be considerable and include legal expenses and awards, non-reimbursable healthcare services, loss of time, loss of reputation for involved individuals and facilities and the negative impact on pay for performance metrics. 

About Patient Safety Technologies, Inc. and SurgiCount Medical
Patient Safety Technologies, Inc., through its wholly-owned operating subsidiary SurgiCount Medical, Inc., provides the Safety-Sponge^® System, a solution clinically proven to improve patient safety and reduce healthcare costs by helping eliminate retained surgical sponges.  The market leading retained sponge prevention solution, the Safety-Sponge^® System is used in more than 285 government, teaching and community hospitals across the U.S., including 7 of the U.S. News and World Report Best Hospital Honor Roll recipients, representing more total users and more Honor Roll users than all retained sponge prevention solutions combined.  For more information, contact SurgiCount Medical, Inc. at (949) 387-2277 or visit www.surgicountmedical.com.

¹ Mehtsun, et al. Surgical never events in the United States, J Surg 2012;10.005

² Cima RR, Kollengode A, Garnatz J, et al. Incidence and characteristics of potential and actual retained foreign object events in surgical patients. J Am Coll Surg 2008;207:80-87

SOURCE SurgiCount Medical, Inc.