If you are an IT company in the US or internationally with services which could be useful to healthcare companies or practitioners, it’s easy to be overly specific and stray into FDA-regulated territory. The always-informative Bradley Merrill Thompson of the Epstein Becker Green law firm delineates the fine regulatory line that general purpose IT companies must observe when working with healthcare customers. First there is intended use, based on how the manufacturer intends its customer to use the product; if the customer uses it for the diagnosis or treatment of disease or other conditions, FDA will regulate it as a medical device. This is less clear than it seems, and Mr Thompson explores where a general IT company can, in the old PR adage, ‘say it safely’ and avoid falling into the unwanted medical device trap by avoiding medical feature and advice claims, and keeping the context away from medical use. The Journal of mHealth (August)–online version, optional PDF download. Hat tip to Mr Thompson via the Continua LinkedIn group. Other articles of interest in the JMH are: Scottish company HCi Viocare and its ‘smart insole’ pressure sensors for foot ulcer detection following, Northwestern University’s research around patterns of smartphone usage detecting depression (page 19) and a lengthy article on transforming patient data into actionable insights (page 34).