[gumby]

Actually a doctor could probably do this in the us too. Weird stuff gets rigged up all the time, it’s just not as common as elsewhere because bugbhospitals have a ton of random stuff in inventory and cost is not constrained.

Also physicians can file INDs with much less paperwork than a company could. But it’s nonzero, so doesn’t happen all that often.

[onetimemanytime]

US doctors would lose their license, savings and home. As soon as a child dies--bound to happen--they'll look for a reason to sue. I guess a US doctor might do a hack like this and called a hero, if the child was born in an airplane or cave somewhere and had no access to a hospital.

[gumby]

Have you ever been in a US emergency room, especially a rural one? The regulations are stiff, but not necessarily rigid, as the law is not a theorem-proving system.

Disclaimer: I am not an MD, but I used to work in drug and medical device development, where the regs did have to be followed strictly to the letter, and became quite familiar with where flexibility was and was not).

(And I meant IDE -- device exemption -- not IND, which is a drug exemption).