About Our Industry

Medical technology innovators are committed to providing physicians the best tools to diagnose and treat patients.  This commitment drives over 6,000 companies in the U.S. to create medical miracles everyday – leading to an 80% increase in patents for breakthrough medical technologies in the last decade.

These companies, most with less than 100 employees, are in the highly competitive business of creating constant progress through constant innovation.  Smaller firms generate 28% of the industry R&D spending.
 

• Investment in R&D more than doubled during the 1990s and now stands at nearly 12% of sales, more than four times the average for manufacturers overall.
• Medical technology provides advanced jobs that pay 49% more per worker than the average manufacturing job.
• From 1980 to 2000, rapid technological progress created results: a 15% decline in annual mortality, a 25% decline in disability rates, a 56% reduction in hospital days—and a 3.2 year increase in life expectancy.
• With all these life saving and life enhancing gains, spending on medical technology remains only 5% of total health care expenditures.