Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Step 2A Prong One
Claim 1 recites access surgical data captured from a plurality of surgical procedures on an operating room basis, the surgical data identifying one or more surgeons and an operating room associated with each of the surgical procedures; determine, autonomously, one or more insights about the surgical data; display a report indicative of the one or more insights comprising a plurality of user-informative elements; receive one or more filter criteria; filter the surgical data based on the one or more filter criteria to adjust an underlying dataset of the user-informative elements; update the one or more insights about the surgical data based on the adjustment to the underlying dataset; and display updates to the user-informative elements and the one or more insights based on the adjustment to the underlying dataset.
Claim 12 recites accessing surgical data captured from a plurality of surgical procedures, the surgical data identifying one or more surgeons and an operating room associated with each of the surgical procedures; analyzing the surgical data to determine one or more insights about use of the operating rooms and actions performed by the one or more surgeons; displaying the one or more insights; filtering the surgical data based on the one or more filter criteria; updating the one or more insights about the surgical data based on the filtering; and displaying updates to the one or more insights.
Claim 17 recites accessing surgical data captured from a plurality of surgical procedures, the surgical data identifying one or more surgeons and an operating room associated with each of the surgical procedures; analyzing the surgical data to determine one or more insights about the surgical procedures; displaying the one or more insights; filtering the surgical data based on the one or more filter criteria; updating the one or more insights about the surgical data based on the filtering; and displaying updates to the one or more insights.
These limitations, as drafted, given the broadest reasonable interpretation, encompass managing personal interactions, which is a subgrouping of Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity. For example, the claims encompass accessing information about surgical procedures in an operating room, determining and creating a report about insights in the surgical data, filtering and updating the data in the report. This could be carried out by a user creating reports for procedures and operating rooms. Such manual steps encompass Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity.
Claims 2-9 and 11-13 incorporate the abstract idea identified above and recite additional limitations that expand on the abstract idea. Claims 2, 13, and 18 further expands on the insights. Although the claim recites the insights are determined “based on video streams,” the recitation encompasses a user viewing a video and determining an insight. Claims 3-5 further define the data displayed and updated in the report. Claim 6 further recites elements of the report, including a user comment box to send a message to another user to request comments. This could be carried out by a user manually filling out information and sending a request to another user. Claims 7-9, 14-16, 19 further recite updating and adding additional and different types of information to the report. Claim 10 defines different types of filters used in creating the report. Claim 11, 20 further defines elements of the report. As explained above, these manual steps encompass Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity.
Step 2A Prong Two
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the remaining elements amount to no more than general purpose computer components programmed to perform the abstract ideas.
Claims 1-20, directly or indirectly, recite the following additional elements at a high level of generality and merely utilized as tools to implement the abstract idea:
Claim 1:
a memory device; and one or more processors coupled with the memory device, the one or more processors.
an operating room dashboard.
Claim 12:
an operating room dashboard.
the operating room dashboard.
Claim 17:
A computer program product comprising a memory device with computer readable instructions stored thereon, wherein executing the computer readable instructions by one or more processing units causes the one or more processing units to perform a plurality of operations.
Claims 7-8, 14-15, 19:
the operating room dashboard.
These additional elements are recited at a high degree of generality and amount to no more than generic computer components, including a generic computer display (dashboard) to carry out the abstract idea.
The written description discloses that the recited computer components encompass generic components including “dashboard 120 is viewed and interacted upon on a device such as a smartphone, tablet computer, or other such electronic devices” (see paragraph 0057) and “using a computer such as a server computer, a desktop computer, a tablet computer, etc.” (see paragraph 0061). As set forth in the MPEP 2106.04(d) “merely including instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer” is an example of when an abstract idea has not been integrated into a practical application.
Claims 11 and 20, recite the following additional elements at a high level of generality, generally linking the abstract idea to a particular technological environment:
Claims 11 and 20:
the operating room dashboard is configured for display on a mobile device by displaying…responsive to a first user input scrolling in a first direction and displaying…responsive to a second user input scrolling in a second direction that is orthogonal to the first direction.
The mobile device with scrolling directions is broadly recited and there is no indication that the combination of the mobile display and the other recited limitations provides any type of technical improvement or an improvement to another technical field.
Step 2B
The claim(s) does/do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because as discussed above with respect to integration into a practical application, the additional elements are recited at a high level of generality, and the written description indicates that these elements are generic computer components. Using generic computer components to perform abstract ideas does not provide a necessary inventive concept. See Alice, 573 U.S. at 223 (“mere recitation of a generic computer cannot transform a patent-ineligible abstract idea into a patent-eligible invention.”).
Generally linking the abstract idea to a particular technological environment (e.g. scrolling on a mobile display) does not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea (see MPEP 2016.05(h) and Affinity Labs of Texas v. DirecTV, LLC, 838 F.3d 1253, 120 USPQ2d 1201 (Fed. Cir. 2016)).
Additionally, the aforementioned additional elements, considered in combination, do not provide an improvement to a technical field or provide a technical improvement to a technical problem. These additional elements merely carry out the abstract idea through data collection, data processing, and data display. Therefore, whether considered alone or in combination, the additional elements do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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.
Claim(s) 1-10 and 12-19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wiener, US Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0313341 in view of Souissi, US Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0020476.
As per claim 1, Wiener teaches a system comprising: a memory device; and one or more processors coupled with the memory device, the one or more processors (see paragraph 0193; processor that performs operations on data stored in memory) configured to: access surgical data captured from a plurality of surgical procedures, the surgical data identifying one or more surgeons associated with each of the surgical procedures (see paragraph 0270; collects data related to the procedures performed by the surgeons; paragraph 0275 describes surgeon and procedure-specific data that has been gathered and analyzed); determine, autonomously, one or more insights about the surgical data (see paragraph 0275; describes insights about surgeon performance during procedures); display a report indicative of the one or more insights on an operating room dashboard comprising a plurality of user-informative elements (see paragraphs 0284-0287 and 0290; various displays of dashboards with user-informative elements depicting the insights); receive one or more filter criteria (see paragraph 0292; user may input filtering criteria); filter the surgical data based on the one or more filter criteria to adjust an underlying dataset of the user-informative elements (see paragraph 0292; data is filtered for display in the user-informative elements, such as filtering which events are displayed, which category of events are shown, etc.); update the one or more insights about the surgical data based on the adjustment to the underlying dataset (see paragraph 0292; data is updated for the display); and display updates to the user-informative elements and the one or more insights based on the adjustment to the underlying dataset (see paragraph 02952; updated data is displayed).
While Wiener teaches the surgical data is from procedures performed in operating rooms (see paragraph 0168; obtains data from within a surgical operating room), Wiener does not explicitly identify the captured data being on an operating room basis identifying an operating room associated with each of the surgical procedures. Souissi teaches capturing data on an operating room basis, identifying an operating room associated with each of a plurality of surgical procedures (see paragraphs 0017-0018; obtains and displays information on an operating room basis, including identifying operating rooms associated with surgical procedures and surgeons performing the procedures). Since both Wiener and Souissi capture data identifying surgical procedures for display on a dashboard interface, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing date to include operating room information in the data collected and displayed in the dashboard of Wiener with the motivation of further addressing issues with errors and coordination in surgical settings by displaying relevant data to involved users (see paragraph 0014-0016).
As per claim 2, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 1 as described above. Wiener further teaches he one or more insights are determined based on video streams of the surgical procedures (see paragraph 0283; insights, such as usage data, may be displayed in connection with related video of procedure)
As per claim 3, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 1 as described above. Wiener further teaches the plurality of user-informative elements comprises one or more of: a total case and case forecast view, a per-operating-room view, an average daily case and usage view, a procedures-by-duration view, a procedure-by-volume view, a case complexity view, a per-capture-computer view, and a surgeon summary view (see paragraphs 0284-0287; display elements include surgical procedure summary, average time and usage, etc.).
As per claim 4, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 3 as described above. Wiener further teaches the total case and case forecast view comprises display filtering options to highlight one or more of: long case durations, short case durations, high volume complex cases, and reduced staff cases (the total case and case forecast view is recited in the alternative as “one or more of” a plurality of views. Therefore, the prior art need not teach this specific view to be encompassed by the claim as a whole).
As per claim 5, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 4 as described above. Wiener further teaches the one or more insights are autonomously updated based on detection of a user selection of one of the display filtering options (see paragraph 0292; user may select filtering criteria to update displayed insights).
As per claim 6, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 1 as described above. Wiener further teaches the one or more processors are configured to add a multi-user comment box to a user-selected portion of the user-informative elements based on a user-initiated comment command, and wherein the multi-user comment box triggers sending of a message to a targeted user to request a response to a comment entered in the multi-user comment box (see paragraph 0283; user can input flags or tags to specific portions of the procedure. The tags or flags are encompassed by multi-user comment box. Paragraph 0287; the flagged portions of the procedure trigger user review of video captured by the system based on the timestamp of the flagged portion of the procedure. Providing user review of specific portions of the procedure is encompassed by a request to respond to the flag of the multi-user comment box).
As per claim 7, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 1 as described above. Wiener further teaches the operating room dashboard is configured to add, delete, or reposition the user-informative elements based on a user command (see paragraph 0283; data is organized based on the user input of flags).
As per claim 8, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 1 as described above. Wiener further teaches the one or more processors are configured to: display a menu of items to available to display in the user-informative elements (see paragraph 0292; user may select category filters from a drop down menu); and add a new user-informative element to the operating room dashboard based on a user selection from the menu (see paragraph 0292; new user-informative element is added by displaying a new screen with the filtered data).
As per claim 9, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 8 as described above. Wiener further teaches the menu of items comprises two or more of: an approach, a complexity score, an instrument score, an engagement level, specialties, trainees, an average case timing, daily usage, computer identifiers, insights, operating rooms, surgeons, total number of cases, and types of procedures (see paragraphs 0284-0287; display elements include surgical procedure summary, average time and usage, etc. as a result of the menu item selection).
As per claim 10, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 1 as described above. Wiener further teaches the one or more filter criteria comprise one or more of: a date range selection, a case duration selection, a surgeon selection, a procedure selection, a specialty selection, an operating room selection, a complexity score selection, and a patient selection (see Figure 26 showing filtered by date).
Claims 12-16 recite substantially similar method claims to system claims 1-2 and 8-9 and, as such, are rejected for similar reasons as given above.
Claims 17-19 recite substantially similar computer program limitations to system claims 1-3 and, as such, are rejected for similar reasons as given above.
Claim(s) 11 and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wiener, US Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0313341 in view of Souissi, US Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0020476 and further in view of Kakaire, US Patent Application Publication No. 2021/0097473.
As per claim 11, Wiener and Souissi teaches the system of claim 1 as described above. Wiener further teaches the operating room dashboard is configured for display by displaying the user-informative elements responsive to a first user input and displaying the one or more insights responsive to a second user input (see paragraphs 0283 and 0292; elements are filtered and insights are flagged). Wiener and Souissi does not explicitly teach the display on a mobile device responsive to scrolling in a first direction and scrolling in a second direction that is orthogonal to the first direction. Kakaire teaches displaying data on a mobile device (see Figure 35) responsive to scrolling in a first direction and scrolling in a second direction that is orthogonal to the first direction (see paragraph 0349). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing date to implement the mobile display scrolling for display of the data in Wiener and Souissi with the motivation of improving the flexibility of access to the data, regardless of type of viewing device (see paragraph 0008 of Kakaire).
Claim 20 recites substantially similar computer program limitations to system claim 11 and, as such, is rejected for similar reasons as given above.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
Wolf, International Publication No. 2020/172414, discloses displaying an aggregated surgical video summary of a surgical procedure in an operating room. Note: file too large to include with office action.
Larson, US Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0285017, discloses analyzing operating room usage rates and displaying forecasted use.
Moore, US Patent Application Publication No. 2014/0249857, discloses displaying patient data on a mobile device with directional scrolling to adjust displayed data.
Martinez-Millana, Process Mining Dashboard in Operating Rooms: Analysis of Staff Expectations with Analytic Hierarchy Process, discloses an operating room dashboard identifying patient flows from patients undergoing procedures.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to C. Luke Gilligan whose telephone number is (571)272-6770. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Friday 9:00 - 5:00.
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C. Luke Gilligan
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3683
/CHRISTOPHER L GILLIGAN/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3683
