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groups, was completed in late 2000. This standard will
allow manufacturers to ensure that cardiac pacemakers
and defibrillators are safe from wireless phone EMI.
FDA has tested hearing aids for interference from
handheld wireless phones and helped develop a
voluntary standard sponsored by the Institute of
Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). This
standard specifies test methods and performance
requirements for hearing aids and wireless phones so
that no interference occurs when a person uses a
compatible phone and a compatible hearing aid at the
same time. This standard was approved by the IEEE in
2000.
FDA continues to monitor the use of wireless phones
for possible interactions with other medical devices.
Should harmful interference be found to occur, FDA
will conduct testing to assess the interference and work
to resolve the problem.
10. What are the results of the research done already?
The research done thus far has produced conflicting
results, and many studies have suffered from flaws in
their research methods. Animal experiments
investigating the effects of radio frequency energy (RF)
exposures characteristic of wireless phones have yielded
conflicting results that often cannot be repeated in other
laboratories. A few animal studies, however, have
suggested that low levels of RF could accelerate the
development of cancer in laboratory animals. However,
many of the studies that showed increased tumor
development used animals that had been genetically
engineered or treated with cancer causing chemicals so
as to be pre-disposed to develop cancer in the absence of
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Section 13 : Health and Safety Information
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