And They Wonder Why Their Defective Product Recalls Aren't Particularly Effective

Yesterday, the FDA, in conjunction with two private firms, presented a report on the findings of their research study at the FDAnews Medical Device Quality Congress. Interestingly, their research demonstrated that less than 10 percent of the more than 200 companies surveyed used any type of electronic database to record customer complaints or other product issues; in the same vein, the official recordkeeping at more than 80 percent of those companies was still maintained did so on paper, or the equivalent.

This study seems modeled after those discussed in our earlier articles, Food Manufacturers Group Publishes Proposals to Improve Defective Product Recalls and New Report Finds Government Recalls of Defective Products Ineffective, and reaches similar conclusions: in order to have any chance at improving consumer safety, defective product recalls must be brought into the new millenium, using modern technology. Unfortunately, it seems that the conclusions of this new FDA study break little to no new ground. Stated differently, tell us something we don't know that can actually help remove safety hazards from consumer's hands.