WARNING LETTER
E-Care Technology Corp.
MARCS-CMS 605117 —
March 02, 2020
Delivery Method:
VIA UNITED PARCEL SERVICE
Product:
Medical Devices
Recipient:
Recipient Name
Mr. Kun-Yuan Ko
Recipient Title
Managing Director
E-Care Technology Corp.
8F-11, No. 35, Hsin-Tai Road
Chubei City
Hsinchu County
302
Taiwan
Issuing Office:
Center for Devices and Radiological Health
10903 New Hampshire Avenue
Silver Spring
,
MD
20993
United States
March 2, 2020
WARNING LETTER
Dear Mr. Ko:
During an inspection of your firm located in Chubei City, Taiwan on October 22, 2019 through October 25, 2019, an investigator from the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) determined that your firm manufactures the Swaive Thermometer. Under section 201(h) of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (the Act), 21 U.S.C. § 321(h), these products are devices because they are intended for use in the diagnosis of disease or other conditions or in the cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease, or to affect the structure or function of the body.
This inspection revealed that these devices are adulterated within the meaning of section 501(h) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 351(h), in that the methods used in, or the facilities or controls used for, their manufacture, packing, storage, or installation are not in conformity with the current good manufacturing practice requirements of the Quality System regulation found at Title 21,
Code of Federal Regulations
(CFR), Part 820.
We received responses from Mr. Ko dated November 13, 2019, December 30, 2019 and February 5, 2020 concerning our investigator’s observations noted on the Form FDA 483 (FDA 483), List of Inspectional Observations, which was issued to your firm. We address this response below, in relation to each of the noted violations. These violations include, but are not limited to, the following:
1. Failure to establish and maintain design validation procedures to ensure that devices conform to defined user needs and intended uses and shall include testing of production units under actual or simulated use conditions, as required by 21 CFR 820.30(g). Specifically:
a. Your firm’s design control procedure,
(b)(4)
, Rev E, dated June 9, 2017, requires design validation to be performed under defined operating conditions on initial production units, lots or batches or their equivalents. “Performance Testing – Clinical” report for Class II Swaive Thermometer shows that the testing was conducted on January 15, 2015. The report does not provide a lot number, or control number associated with the device(s) that was used for validation. Your firm has no documentation of the design configuration used for testing, and therefore you have not established that the devices are initial production units or their equivalents, or the scope of applicability of the testing.
The response dated 11/13/19 is not adequate. In your response, your firm states that lot #15040306 is the lot number for the clinical trial, and you did not record the device information at the time of testing. Your firm also states that this lot production began on December 15, 2014 through January 25, 2015; and the planned schedule is such that the 3rd week is manufacturing, the 4th week for release but not for this lot which was intended for clinical testing. You clarified that the clinical testing was conducted during January 08, 2015 through January 15, 2015. You have also amended the original clinical test report with the lot #, device name, device model #, SN, and test date as part of your response. This response is inadequate as it does not include determination of the need for corrective action(s) to ensure that design validation documentation will include documentation of the device configuration for future design validation activities.
b. Validation of device software is inadequate and is incomplete. Specifically, your firm did not conduct or document the results of software requirement specification and software design specification in your software verification and validation report for your Class II Swaive Thermometer. The verification and validation report did not document the results of the following requirements:
i. Display temperature data and warning when low voltage alarm exhibits, object’s temperature over range, ambient temperature over range
ii. Execution of mathematics operation
iii. Display information on 3x12 LCD display with 4 decimal digits and 5 icons
iv. Display “LO BAT” when the battery voltage is below 2.4V
v. Display “AH” when the ambient temperature is higher than 40ºC and “AL” when the ambient temperature is lower than 10ºC.
vi. Display “_ _ _E” when the object’s temperature is higher than 42.2ºC
The response dated November 13, 2019 is not adequate. Per your firm’s software verification and validation report, section 7 includes a table of design requirements, design specifications, verification and validation test requirements; and section 10 includes a table of the measurement test report with the test description, criteria, test results (°C) and remarks (P/F). The design requirements in section 7 state an object can be measured from
(b)(4)
at an environment from
(b)(4)
. The verification and validation test requirements in section 7 state “Measure blackbody temperatures in different ambient temperatures. These states should include the extreme conditions:” blackbody:
(b)(4)
at ambient temperatures
(b)(4)
and
(b)(4)
and black body
(b)(4)
at ambient temperatures
(b)(4)
and
(b)(4)
. This test is to ensure the software executes mathematical operations correctly under extreme conditions and normal conditions and the mitigates the hazard of displaying error temperature data due to incorrect mathematical protocol. These specifications are confusing as the design requirement for the ambient temperature should be
(b)(4)
, but the verification requirements for ambient temperature are
(b)(4)
.
In your response, you note that your firm did not document the results of software verification for the software design requirements and specifications. On November 5, 2019 your firm conducted a software verification and provided the results in document CAPA2. The report does not address all design requirements such as the testing at extreme temperatures, nor does it provide the measured temperatures throughout testing to determine if the design specification was met.
c. Your firm’s Risk Management Report, Version
(b)(4)
, dated January 05, 2019, for Swaive Thermometer is inadequate and is incomplete, in that it did not identify all potential failure modes/ risk mitigations for:
- Storage or operation outside prescribed environmental conditions
- Incorrect measurements
- Sharp edges
- Inadequate packaging
- Issues with embedded software
These were not considered for possible hazards and contributing factors associated with the device risks; however, they were identified in the firm’s test reports and software verification report as potential failures modes.
The response dated November 13, 2019, is not adequate. In your response, your firm acknowledges your risk management report is inadequate, and on November 1, 2019 you reviewed the risk management report and provided it for review. While your firm has updated your Risk Management to include the specific potential failure modes identified in the observation, there are no risk mitigations noted for any of the failure modes. Therefore, it is unclear how you have determined that the overall residual risk is acceptable for all of their failure modes. Additionally, it does not appear the firm performed any review or analysis to ensure this issue does not occur in the future.
2. Failure to ensure that all inspection, measuring, and test equipment, including mechanical, automated, or electronic inspection and test equipment, is suitable for its intended purposes and is capable of producing valid results, as required by 21 CFR 820.72(a). Specifically, your firm is utilizing
(b)(4)
to calibrate Swaive infrared thermometers. There are no documents to confirm the
(b)(4)
was installed and operates appropriately. Your firm has not conducted or documented installation, operational or test method validation for your measuring equipment to ensure that it is capable of producing valid results.
The response dated November 13, 2019 is not adequate. In your response you provide a document, which you claim demonstrates an outside consultant performed the equipment validation (or calibration) on June 29, 2015 for the water baths. Please note that the document was mostly in a foreign language, and thus we were not able to completely interpret it. Additionally, your firm conducted
(b)(4)
testing on November 5, 2019 and provided a report for review and also state “Follow the procedure,
(b)(4)
Equipment control procedure” and you have conducted
(b)(4)
. The test report from 2015, from ITRI, does not provide objective evidence that
(b)(4)
testing was originally performed for the
(b)(4)
as it is written in another language without translation and your response cannot be confirmed. It is unclear if procedure
(b)(4)
is a new procedure developed as a result of this observation; however, this procedure has not been provided for review nor have any records of PQ (or calibration) results been provided for review. It is also unclear how your firm determined a calibration window of
(b)(4)
was acceptable to ensure acceptable performance of your
(b)(4)
. Finally, the
(b)(4)
test report from November 5, 2019 does not appear to be performed in conformance to any standard or include sufficient test method validation to ensure the suitability of the test method. Additionally, it appears you use a 3rd party thermometer,
(b)(4)
, to confirm the temperature of the blackbody “standard” which is subsequently used to verify the operational and performance characteristics of your Swaive Infrared Thermometer. The blackbody temperature should be independently measured in accordance to a standard (ASTM e1965-98; Standard Specification for Infrared Thermometers for Intermittent Determination of Patient Temperature) or through the appropriate method validation.
3. Failure to establish and maintain procedures for receiving, reviewing, and evaluating complaints by a formally designated unit, as required by 21 CFR 820.198(a). Specifically, your firm’s complaint handling procedure,
(b)(4)
, Rev
(b)(4)
, dated June 3, 2019, (and previous revisions), does not have a mechanism in place to receive complaints or customer feedback for products that are sold in the US by your private label customers. Your firm’s Managing Director stated that your firm has not received any customer complaints on devices sold in the US since the previous inspection in 2016.
The responses dated December 30, 2019 is not adequate. Your firm acknowledges that you do not have agreements in place with your distributors to provide complaint information and requested agreements by December 19, 2019. In your response, you provided 2 copied agreements from
(b)(4)
and Swaive Corporation (distributor based in the US) and stated you have updated your complaint handling procedure to require an agreement with your distributors to provide complaint information. However, you have not stated they you will or have requested the complaint history from these firms to perform a retrospective review and analysis to determine if further review, investigation and CAPAs are needed. This is a repeat observation from your 2015 inspection.
4. Failure to establish and maintain procedures to ensure that sampling methods are adequate for your intended use and to ensure that when changes occur the sampling plans are reviewed, as required by 21 CFR 820.250(b). Specifically, the QC inspection table for Class II medical devices as documented in
(b)(4)
, requires a sampling rate of
(b)(4)
at incoming inspection and at the final inspection. Your firm’s Managing Director stated your firm will inspect a minimum of
(b)(4)
per batch/ lot or
(b)(4)
(whichever is greater) at the final inspection. Your sampling plan is not based on a valid statistical rationale.
The response dated December 30, 2019, is not adequate. Your firm acknowledges you did not follow international standards in the determination of their sampling plan and provided an updated document “
(b)(4)
QC Inspection table” per
(b)(4)
for future sampling plan considerations. You note “inspections will follow this standard with inspection level II and AQL (O) for critical defect, AQL (2.5) for major defect and AQL (4) for minor defect”. You anticipated starting this sampling plan from
(b)(4)
. This response is inadequate in that you have not stated that you will/have reviewed existing production records to identify if there is a risk that due to inadequate sampling, this could have resulted in the distribution of nonconforming product. Additionally, if there are potentially nonconforming products due to this oversight, your firm has not identified how you will address these issues.
Our inspection also revealed that your firm’s devices are misbranded under Section 502(t)(2) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 352(t)(2), in that your firm failed or refused to furnish material or information respecting the device that is required by or under Section 519 of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 360i, and 21 CFR Part 803 - Medical Device Reporting. Significant deviations include, but are not limited to:
Failure to develop, maintain, and implement written Medical Device Reporting (MDR) procedures, as required by 21 CFR 803.17. Specifically, your firm’s MDR procedure,
(b)(4)
, does not include the requirements for the timely and effective identification, communication, and evaluations of events that may be subject to MDR requirements; and timely transmission for complete medical device reports. For example, your procedure does not include definition for items such as ‘become aware date’ or ‘malfunction’ or ‘caused or contributed to’ or ‘supplement reports’. In addition, your firm does not have an electronic account with the FDA for the submission of MDRs.
The response dated December 30, 2019 is not adequate in that you have not provided an updated MDR procedure or obtained an eMDR account. The response dated February 5, 2020 is not adequate. While you provided an MDR procedure,
(b)(4)
, for review in this response, you still had not obtained an eMDR account. The response dated February 5, 2020 is also inadequate. While this response confirms you have established an eMDR account you have not stated that you will or have requested the complaint history from your customers to determine if there were events that should have been reported as MDRs or indicated if you intend to request this information. Additionally, this is a repeat observation from the
(b)(4)
inspection.
Given the serious nature of the violations of the Act, the Swaive Thermometer manufactured by your firm is subject to refusal of admission under section 801(a) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 381(a), in that it appears to be adulterated. As a result, FDA is taking steps to refuse entry of these devices into the United States, known as “detention without physical examination,” until these violations are corrected. In order to remove the device from detention, your firm should provide a written response to this Warning Letter as described below and correct the violations described in this letter. We will notify you regarding the adequacy of your firm’s response and the need to re-inspect your firm’s facility to verify that the appropriate corrections and/or corrective actions have been made.
Also, U.S. federal agencies may be advised of the issuance of Warning Letters about devices so that they may take this information into account when considering the award of contracts. Additionally, premarket approval applications for Class III devices to which the Quality System regulation deviations are reasonably related will not be approved until the violations have been corrected.
Please notify this office in writing within fifteen business days from the date you receive this letter of the specific steps your firm has taken to correct the noted violations, including an explanation of how your firm plans to prevent these violations, or similar violations, from occurring again. Include documentation of the corrections and/or corrective actions (which must address systemic problems) that your firm has taken. If your firm’s planned corrections and/or corrective actions will occur over time, please include a timetable for implementation of those activities. If corrections and/or corrective actions cannot be completed within fifteen business days, state the reason for the delay and the time within which these activities will be completed. Please provide a translation of documentation not in English to facilitate our review.
Your firm’s response should be sent to: Food and Drug Administration, Center for Devices and Radiological Health, Office of Regulatory Programs, Division of Regulatory Programs 2: Establishment Support, Regulatory Inspections and Audits Team, White Oak Building 66, Rm 3657, 10903 New Hampshire Ave., Silver Spring, MD 20993.
Refer to CMS case #605117 when replying
. If you have any questions about the contents of this letter, please contact: DHT3C Assistant Director Nikhil Thakur at
301-796-5536
or Nikhil.thakur@fda.hhs.gov.
Finally, you should know that this letter is not intended to be an all-inclusive list of the violations at your firm’s facility. It is your firm’s responsibility to ensure compliance with applicable laws and regulations administered by FDA. The specific violations noted in this letter and in the Inspectional Observations, FDA 483, issued at the close of the inspection may be symptomatic of serious problems in your firm’s manufacturing and quality management systems. Your firm should investigate and determine the causes of the violations, and take prompt actions to correct the violations and bring the products into compliance.
Sincerely yours,
/S/
Benjamin R. Fisher, PhD
Director
OHT3: Office of Office of GastroRenal, ObGyn,
General Hospital, and Urology Devices
Office of Product Evaluation and Quality
Center for Devices and Radiological Health
Content current as of:
04/07/2020
Regulated Product(s)
Medical Devices