Risk Inherent in Benefits of Drug/Device Products?

Dr. Steven Murray, Group Vice President & Principal Engineer in the Electrical & Data Sciences Group for Exponent, assesses and analyzes potential risk and failure of products from underground lateral piping to surgical heart catheters. “In drugs and medical devices, developers really need to consider where their product lies on the scale of risk: Is this a product where it is impossible to disentangle the benefits from some other risk? Or is this a product that, if anything is even a little bit wrong, the benefit doesn't justify it?” he asks. “We're much more accepting to risks in things like cancer drugs or AIDS drugs, where the risk of death is highly present and you're averting it.”