Covestro improves structures in cancer treatment vessel plastics

Makrolon Rx3440 polycarbonate, a new medical polycarbonate from Covestro, offers superior durability and chemical resistance to help prevent cracking so that health care professionals can more safely deliver oncology drugs to patients.

Inferior materials in drips and luers often cannot withstand cleaning agents, nor can they tolerate aggressive solvents found in oncology drugs and other treatments. The result: cracking and damage to critical components.

Compared with other transparent resins used for IV access components, comprehensive lab testing has shown that the polycarbonate provides best-in class chemical and oncology drug resistance. This material also demonstrates the best retention of stress to provide more reliable IV connections.

Makrolon Rx3440 polycarbonate also offers several other advantages for medical manufacturers, including, biocompatibility to ISO 10993-1 and USP Class IV standards; structural integrity to allow for thin-walled designs; resistance to mishandling; dimensional stability in shipping and storage.

George Paleos, Marketing Manager for polycarbonate applications in medical and consumer products at Covestro, said: “We’ve leveraged our knowledge of this highly regulated market to formulate a material that serves an important need, yet requires minimal validation and requalification by manufacturers.”

“Importantly, we’re also able to provide customer support every step of the way from design and material selection to final approval.”