Philips Recalled Breathing Machines in 2021. Chemicals of “Concern” Found in Replacement Machines Raised New Alarm – By Debbie Cenziper, ProPublica; Michael D. Sallah and Evan Robinson-Johnson, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; and Margaret Fleming, Medill Investigative Lab (ProPublica) / Dec 28, 2023
Amid a massive recall in 2021, the medical device maker Philips raced to overcome troubling questions about its replacement machines as customers waited for help.
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On the morning of June 14, 2021, Dr. Radhika Breaden hurried to a computer in her hushed sleep disorders clinic and tried not to panic.
The 52-year-old physician treated patients with heart conditions, cancer and neurological diseases. She cared for veterans with compromised lungs and a woman with Down syndrome. In more than a dozen years of helping people breathe through the night, she had never confronted an emergency that jeopardized nearly all of her patients at once.
Global device maker Philips Respironics was pulling its popular sleep apnea machines and ventilators off the shelves after discovering that an industrial foam built into the devices to reduce noise could release toxic particles and fumes into the masks worn by patients.
Breaden scoured the internet for details, certain that Philips had a plan to quickly ship new, safe machines to the thousands of people under her care at the Portland, Oregon, clinic. “It’s a multibillion-dollar, multinational company,” she recalled telling her staff.
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