ZOLL Medical Corporation (ZOLL), headquartered in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, is a manufacturer of resuscitation devices that help clinicians, EMS professionals, and lay rescuers resuscitate sudden cardiac arrest or trauma victims. The company also designs and markets software that automates the documentation and management of both clinical and non-clinical information.

ZOLL announced recently that the company and Laerdal Medical AS and its U.S. subsidiary, Laerdal Medical Corporation, have entered into a technology licensing agreement. Laerdal Medical, headquartered in Stavanger, Norway and subsidiaries in 23 countries, is a provider of healthcare solutions with products and services for basic life support, advanced life support, patient care, self-directed learning, medical education, defibrillation, airway management and spinal immobilization.

Under the terms of the agreement, ZOLL is licensing to Laerdal non-exclusive worldwide rights under patents owned by or licensed to ZOLL covering feedback in connection with cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), and Laerdal is granting to ZOLL options to license similar rights under patents owned by Laerdal. CPR feedback, marketed as Real CPR Help® by ZOLL and QCPR® by Laerdal, is designed to help improve CRP quality during manual CPR by providing rescuers with immediate “real time” feedback related to compression depth and rate. Currently ZOLL and Laerdal, through its Alliance partner, Philips Healthcare, are the only two companies that provide this technology.

In addition to the technology agreements, ZOLL and Laerdal have also agreed to cooperate in activities to further the development of the overall market for CPR feedback technology, including activities such as funding of clinical studies, work to promote healthcare industry standards, and educational activities aimed at fostering CPR quality improvement.

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