McGaw Credits Gore for Rising Sales of IV Device : Products: The environmentally safe plastic containers were praised by the vice presidential candidate during a visit to Irvine.

McGaw Inc., maker of an environmentally safe container for intravenous fluids, said Friday that sales of the medical product have picked up, partly because of a campaign visit by Sen. Al Gore during a presidential campaign swing.

McGaw said it has recently signed four long-term sales contracts that will account for $100 million in revenue over the next five years. The company’s 1992 sales are expected to reach $300 million.

Chief Executive James M. Sweeney attributed the rise in revenue to the growing acceptance of McGaw’s Excel IV bag, the only intravenous container made of a nontoxic, biologically inert plastic that can be incinerated without producing air pollutants. The Excel bag--unlike other containers for intravenous fluids--also does not allow leaching of carcinogenic substances into the medicine.

Gore, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, visited McGaw’s Irvine operations Aug. 3. During that campaign stop, Gore, who is billing himself as the “environmental vice president,” praised the company for producing an environmentally safe product that, despite its higher cost, is profitable.

“You did it,” he told McGaw employees at the time.

Sweeney said that Gore’s endorsement of the product and a general growing acceptance of its benefits have boosted sales. “This whole Excel thing really seems to be making a difference,” he said. “All other things being equal, this is a superior product. It’s been a big win for us.”

The latest deal involves sales of the IV bag and a McGaw-made IV pump to American Medical International Inc. in Dallas, which operates 35 hospitals in California, Texas and Florida.

The American Medical contract is valued at $30 million over the next five years, company officials said. Other recent sales agreements with Incarnate Word in San Antonio, New York Health and Hospitals Inc. in New York, and Sisters of Charity in Houston add up to an additional $70 million, Sweeney said.