The company, which stylizes its own name as GE HealthCare, operates four divisions: Medical imaging, which includes molecular imaging, computed tomography, magnetic resonance, women’s health screening and X-ray systems; Ultrasound; Patient Care Solutions, which is focused on remote patient monitoring, anesthesia and respiratory care, diagnostic cardiology, and infant care; and Pharmaceutical Diagnostics, which manufactures contrast agents and radiopharmaceuticals.
[citation needed] By 1896, the company also made electrostatic generators for exciting X-ray tubes and electrotherapeutic devices.
[4] Victor's two founders had key roles in the new firm; Charles F. Samms was company president and Julius B. Wantz was Vice-President of manufacturing and engineering.
[4] The merger brought renewed vitality to the organization and Victor entered the foreign market with equipment sold and serviced in nearly 70 countries.
One of the reasons for the name of Medical Systems was due to the increase in the electro-medical business, which began in 1961 with the introduction of patient monitoring equipment.
Up to this time, the medical Systems Division had simply been divided into domestic and international, but in 1987 it reorganized into the three "poles" of America, Europe and Pacific.
[15][16][17] In November 1998, the company acquired the Nuclear and MR businesses of Elscint, (then a division of Elron, based in Haifa, Israel), for $100 million.
Imatron produced an Electron beam tomography (EBT) scanner that performs imaging applications used by physicians specializing in cardiology, pulmonology and gastroenterology.
In March 2002, the company acquired MedicaLogic, creator of the former Logician, an ambulatory Electronic Medical Records system, for approximately $32 million.
[21] In April 2002, GE Healthcare acquired Visualization Technology, a manufacturer of intra-operative medical devices and related products for use in minimally invasive image guided surgery, based in Boston.
In 2003, GE Healthcare acquired Instrumentarium, including its Datex-Ohmeda division, a producer, manufacturer, and supplier of anesthesia machines and mechanical ventilators.
In 2006, Sir William Castell resigned as CEO to become Chairman of the Wellcome Trust, a charity that fosters and promotes human and animal research—in the United Kingdom.
[28][29] In February 2008, GE Healthcare acquired Whatman plc, a global supplier of filtration products and technologies for £363 million.
[33] In April 2010, the company announced it was investing €3 million in the Technology Research for Independent Living Centre (TRIL).
[40][41] In April 2018, the company sold several healthcare information technology assets to Veritas Capital for $1.05 billion.
[45] In January 2021, the company acquired Prismatic Sensors AB, focused on Deep Silicon detector technology.
[54] In February 2023, GE Healthcare acquired Caption Health, an artificial intelligence medical technology manufacturer headquartered in San Mateo, California, for $150 million.
[56] In 1994, GE Healthcare ignored advice of its safety experts to proactively restrict the use of its MRI contrast agent, Omniscan.
[57] It also tried to conceal evidence of its risks by telling its researchers to "burn the data", as revealed during a trial opposing debilitated consumers[58] due to its accumulation in multiple organs.
In 2009, GE Healthcare sued for defamation a radiologist at the University of Copenhagen Hospital who linked the uses of Omniscan to gadolinium induced fibrosis after 20 of his patients (from which 1 died) suffered from it after its administration.
[59] In 2017, GE Healthcare opposed the European Medicines Agency (EMA) suspending the use of Omniscan (along other linear agents), despite evidence of the high cytotoxicity of gadodiamide[60] and its likelihood to dissociate after deposition.
In a 2020 study, another MRI dye, Clariscan, was retained more in the cerebrum, cerebellum, kidney and liver of rats than those injected Dotarem, its original drug.
According to a report in The Independent in January 2016, the company received more money back in tax benefits (£1.6 million) in the UK in the previous 12 years than it paid.
[62] In 2011, the company agreed to pay $30 million to settle allegations that a company it acquired in 2004, Amersham Health, violated the False Claims Act of 1863 by knowingly providing false or misleading information to Medicare, causing the government to reimburse Myoview at artificially inflated rates.