Preventing IV fluid shortages

Trump administration to demonstrate technology

The Trump administration announced June 5 two locations that will demonstrate a point-of-care technology to prevent intravenous fluid shortages in the U.S.

Caspian, an automated point-of-care sterile saline manufacturing system, began development in 2019 in response to President Donald Trump’s efforts to “address persistent medical supply chain disruptions,” according to a news release from the Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response.

“On-demand, on-site production technology is critical to our efforts to reshore American manufacturing, secure domestic supply chains, and reduce U.S. dependence on foreign nations for critical medicines and therapies,” the release said.

One Caspian unit will be delivered to Bethesda, Maryland to demonstrate how the saline-on-demand system can help meet patients’ needs in medical facilities, and the other will be delivered to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for additional review.

Automated, integrated quality controls in each unit are connected to a cloud-based quality manager to ensure all the final IV products meet all quality specifications, according to the release.