DETAILED ACTION
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claim 14 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) for failure to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter applicant regards as the invention.
Regarding claim 14, there is a reference to the plate section. Neither this claim nor any parent claim makes any reference to the plate section (it first appears in claim 9). Thus there is no antecedent basis for the plate section. Correction or clarification is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1-8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Toly (US 6,780,016) in view of Jarc et al. (US 2014/0051049).
Regarding claims 1 and 6, Toly discloses a simulation system for medical training, including injections. See col. 2: 24-41.
Toly discloses wherein the system comprises a skin layer and a second layer of subcutaneous tissue. See col. 5: 17-20 and col. 5: 61-62.
Toly does not disclose a layer that blocks the needle except in correct locations with a through hole (claim 6). However, Toly discloses multiple layers with various properties, and this through-hole concept this is established, as is disclosed by the medical training system of Jarc in paragraph 0061. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of applicant’s filing, to consider the through-hole concept with the layers of the Toly system, in order to provide various injection training scenarios.
Regarding claims 2-4, Toly discloses a muscle layer under the subcutaneous fat layer. See col. 6: 42-43. The layers may be ‘stacked’ as desired for a particular anatomical simulation. See col. 4:62 – col. 5:16. Using a layer to block or allow injections would be obvious as described above with regard to claim 1.
Regarding claim 5, Toly does not disclose a structure for reference for a puncture location. However, this concept is disclosed by Jarc in fig.4. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of applicant’s filing to incorporate this concept into the Toly invention, to provide various training scenarios.
Regarding claims 7-8, Jarc discloses making through holes as required for an application. See paragraph 0061. This would encompass the shapes and dimensions claimed by applicant. The use of such a scheme would be obvious as described above with regard to claim 1.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 9-13 are objected to as depending from a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten to include the base claim and any intermediate claims. The prior art does not teach or suggest the structure of claim 9, including the bowed plate section.
Conclusion
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TIMOTHY A. MUSSELMAN
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3715
/TIMOTHY A MUSSELMAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3715