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Disability Issues Bring AirTran $500K Penalty

(WASHINGTON) — The Transportation Department said Monday that it has issued a $500,000 civil penalty against AirTran Airways for violating rules about accommodating disabled travelers.

The government said the airline had violated rules governing assistance given to passengers during boarding, and that it frequently failed to provide an adequate written response to passenger complaints. The airline also failed to properly categorize disability complaints in reports it filed with the government.

Aastrom Biosciences says Phase 2 study results positive

By Tom Henderson

Ann Arbor-based Aastrom Biosciences Inc. (Nasdaq: ASTM) presented encouraging results of a Phase 2 study on patients with critical limb ischemia before the annual Society for Vascular Surgery meeting in Boston Friday afternoon.

Critical limb ischemia is a blockage of the arteries that often results in open wounds and gangrene.

The study, involving 32 patients with a mean age of 68 who received Aastrom's bone-marrow treatment and 14 patients who received placebos, was conducted at 18 sites in the U.S. It was randomized and double-blinded, meaning that neither patients nor doctors knew who received placebos.

The study showed that the treatment was safe and that it resulted in significant improvement in wounds for those getting treatment.

At the six-month mark in the study, 43 percent of those getting placebos had undergone an amputation, compared to 19 percent of those getting the treatment.

Aastrom has developed stem-cell-based therapies for a variety of conditions, using cells from a patient's own bone marrow to grow stem cells and progenitor cells that are injected into the patient during treatment.

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