Japan disaster is felt by St. Jude Medical

St. Jude Medical reported its net income for the first three months of this year slipped 2 percent to $233 million, as costs from a major acquisition last year outweighed revenue gains.

The operations in Japan of the maker of pacemakers and artificial heart valves took about a $5 million hit because of the earthquake and tsunami that rocked that nation.

St. Jude continues to process customer orders and provide products and services to support Japanese patients. But St. Jude CEO Dan Starks said its some 650 employees are having a hard time, with their homes, communication, commuting and rolling electrical outages.

"We've got people who have been sleeping in offices," Starks said. "We have people with all kinds of adaptation on communications. The commuter lines have been shut down and otherwise disrupted. The rolling power outages continue."

"This puts into perspective the modest significance of our business versus other events in people's lives," Starks said. "And so people's priorities appropriately are toward their families and toward working to help others who were impacted by this devastation rather than focusing with the normal level of priority on our business."

St. Jude estimates the disaster in Japan might cost it as much as $35 million this year.