Star Tribune (Indianapolis), "Guidant promises openness"

          While defending its actions over a recent spate of recalls of its heart devices, a Guidant Corp. executive acknowledged that the industry is entering a new era of disclosure, with doctors demanding more information on product safety than ever before.
          The medical technology company, which makes heart defibrillators and pacemakers at its campus in Arden Hills, has come under fire in recent weeks for failing to notify doctors early on that some of its implantable cardiac defibrillators could malfunction on rare occasions.
          "People wish to know more, so we will provide more quality performance information in greater quantity and with greater frequency. Plain and simple," said Fred McCoy, president of Guidant's $2.5 billion cardiac rhythm management division, in an interview with the Star Tribune earlier this week.
          Any change in the way product reliability information is distributed would not only affect the thousands of increasingly inquisitive patients who will receive the life-saving devices in coming years, but the local companies that make them, including Medtronic Inc. and St. Jude Medical Inc.