Originally Published MPMN July/August 2005

EDITOR'S PAGE

We’ve Gone Platinum!

MPMN is celebrating its platinum anniversary this month! 2005 marks our 20th year of reporting on the medical device industry.
Back in 1985, Medical Product Manufacturing News was launched to fill a need for OEMs looking to source materials, supplies, and services for their exciting new products. Obviously, it struck a chord with you, because you and your colleagues are still reading the magazine 20 years later!

Over the years, we’ve gone through some changes. Editors have come and gone, and we’ve had a few facelifts along the way, but our mission remains the same. We are the only product tabloid for medical device design engineers and industry professionals. And over the past 20 years, we’ve given you a lot of product information in a graphic,easy-to-access format.

To celebrate our anniversary, we invite you not only to travel with us down memory lane, but also to turn your sights toward the future. In the first of our feature stories, we take a look back at the trends in industry from a supplier’s perspective. We talked to companies that have partnered with MPMN since its inception and gained valuable insight into how they’ve seen the industry evolve. Turn to page 44 for the full scoop.

In the second story, consultant Mark Ettlinger peers into his crystal ball and writes about how he believes medical devices will look in 2025. Ettlinger is a mechanical design engineer who has developed numerous minimally invasive surgical devices; drug-delivery products; catheters; dressings; prosthetics; and implantable stents, anchors, and screws. He talked to sources ranging from NIH to MIT to FDA to write this story on the future of medical devices.

I don’t know how much of a psychic he is, but he does know the industry very well, so be sure to check out his article, The Future of Healthcare: 2025 A.D., on page 50. And who knows, some of the devices he talks about you may be working on already.

Also, to commemorate our 20 years in this industry, we’ve included a foldout timeline inserted in the center of the magazine. It lists important events in industry, FDA, and science and society from 1985 to 2005. Maybe it will spark a bit of nostalgia as you remember fondly the day you first heard about laser angioplasty, or Intel’s Pentium processor, or the FDA Modernization Act.

We heard one thing over and over as we prepared this issue—that the medical device industry has always been robust. And it will only get stronger, especially as our population ages. Need for newer, better, smaller, quicker devices will grow in the future. No worries, though. MPMN will be there, providing you with all the latest information about supplies, components, and services.

Thank you for your support these past 20 years. We’ve always relied on our readers to tell us what they’d like to see in the magazine. Please feel free to give us your ideas for topics for future issues. You can reach us via e-mail at [email protected].

Susan Wallace, Managing Editor

Copyright ©2005 Medical Product Manufacturing News