From my review today in the WSJ of Innovation Breakdown by Joseph Gulfo:

In “Innovation Breakdown: How the FDA and Wall Street Cripple Medical Advances,” Joseph Gulfo tells the tumultuous history of MELA Sciences, the company that invented MelaFind. When Dr. Gulfo joined the firm as president and CEO in 2004, the company’s brilliant team of scientists had spent many years and tens of millions of dollars to develop MelaFind, a “camera with a brain”—optical technology that would scan potential melanomas in multiple spectra and then, using sophisticated algorithms and large datasets, diagnose which were most likely to be cancerous.

Yo is a smartphone app. MelaFind is a medical device. Yo sends one meaningless message: “Yo!” MelaFind tells you: “biopsy this and don’t biopsy that.” MelaFind saves lives. Yo does not. Guess which firm found it easier to put their product in consumers hands? Oy.

MELA Sciences conducts an extensive clinical trial according to a protocol agreed on by the FDA and all looks good. After the clinical trial is completed, however, the FDA backs away from the protocol and comes out against MelaFind.

…The title of Dr. Gulfo’s book is “Innovation Breakdown” but “Innovator’s Breakdown” might have been more apt. The letter sent the author into survival mode. He battled the FDA, calmed investors, and defended against the lawsuit all while trying to keep the company afloat. Under stress, Dr. Gulfo’s health began to decline: He lost 29 pounds, his hair began to fall out, and the pain in his gut became so intense he needed an endoscopy. When his wife begged him to quit, he refused. They turned into roommates. “We were nothing more than cordial. I basically shut my wife out of my life,” he writes.

…The climax to this medical thriller comes when, in “the greatest 15 minutes of [his] life,” Dr. Gulfo delivers an impassioned speech, à la “Twelve Angry Men,” to the FDA’s advisory committee. The committee voted for approval, 8 to 7, and, perhaps with the congressional hearing in mind, the FDA approved MelaFind in September 2011.

It was a major triumph for the company, but Dr. Gulfo was beat. He retired from the company in June 2013—just in time to save his marriage.

Yet remarkably, given his experience, Mr. Gulfo writes that he still believes in a strong FDA. He argues in the book that better “leadership” and a few tweaks to existing rules can fix the problem. He’s wrong.

Compare MelaFind’s experience in the U.S. with its reception in Europe: MelaFind was submitted for marketing approval in Europe in May 2011. It was approved just five months later. One key reason for Europe’s efficient approval process is that European governments don’t review medical devices directly. Instead they certify independent “notified bodies” that specialize and compete to review new products. The European system works more quickly than the U.S. system, and there is no evidence that it results in reduced patient safety. Rather than tweak the current system, why doesn’t the U.S. just adopt the European model and call it a day? Our health and our economy would be better off for it.

Google’s Sergey Brin recently said that he didn’t want to be a health entrepreneur because “It’s just a painful business to be in . . . the regulatory burden in the U.S. is so high that I think it would dissuade a lot of entrepreneurs.” Mr. Brin won’t find anything in Dr. Gulfo’s book to persuade him otherwise. Until we get our regulatory system in order, expect a lot more Yo’s and not enough life-saving innovations.