BIOTRONIK Announces First U.S. Implantation of the New Belos VR-T ICD with Home Monitoring Technology

Business Wire, May 3, 2002

Business Editors

LAKE OSWEGO, Ore--(BW HealthWire)--May 3, 2002

BIOTRONIK, Inc. announced today the first U.S. implantation of Belos VR-T, the world's only state-of-the-art ICD featuring the company's exclusive Home Monitoring Technology. With this new wireless cellular system, a patient's BIOTRONIK ICD is now able to automatically transmit critical data about the patient's current condition to his or her physician's office, anytime, anywhere.

The Belos VR-T was implanted by Dr. Roy Sauberman in a 59- year-old male at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, Newark, NJ. According to Dr Sauberman, "Today's implant marks the first step toward a new generation of ICDs allowing physicians the ability to monitor their patients remotely. This wireless capability will provide added safety and comfort to patients and improve patient management practices for physicians."

The extremely compact (39cc/12mm) Belos VR-T ICD is a full-featured device with tiered therapy and a sophisticated tachyarrhythmia diagnostic package. The Belos VR-T offers 30 joules of delivered energy, multiple pacing therapies, a full hour of high fidelity IEGMs, a 24-hour Holter, time-controlled interval recordings, and optional far-field IEGMS. Due to its Home Monitoring feature, Belos VR-T is anticipated to revolutionize the way physicians currently monitor their ICD patients.

BIOTRONIK's Home Monitoring System is already proving its value to clinicians in the currently released Philos DR-T pacemaker. The automatic system sends rapid notification of a patient's vital clinical condition, which may help physicians provide therapeutic intervention. Since Home Monitoring requires no patient involvement and is completely mobile, patients can go about their daily routines while their device sends information to their physician's office.

Thomas Brown, Executive Vice President for Biotronik, Inc., states: "The Home Monitoring feature is a significant step towards automating remote patient management related to cardiac pacemakers and implantable cardiac defibrillators in the U.S. and Worldwide. This is an important advancement that will allow BIOTRONIK to provide significant value added services to our customers both today and in the future."

BIOTRONIK, Inc. is recognized worldwide as a complete provider of cardiovascular products of the highest quality and reliability. The company is committed to researching and developing new biomedical products. Its unmatched reliability record is the result of maintaining the highest standards in engineering and design. The company's U.S. headquarters are located in Lake Oswego, Oregon, and its worldwide headquarters are in Berlin, Germany.