Fresenius Medical Care Holdings, Inc.Download PDFPatent Trials and Appeals BoardMay 29, 20202019004062 (P.T.A.B. May. 29, 2020) Copy Citation UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www.uspto.gov APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 14/600,107 01/20/2015 Lee Tanenbaum FMC-004US 4584 54004 7590 05/29/2020 MUIRHEAD AND SATURNELLI, LLC 200 FRIBERG PARKWAY SUITE 1001 WESTBOROUGH, MA 01581 EXAMINER QUIGLEY, KYLE ROBERT ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2865 MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE 05/29/2020 PAPER Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte LEE TANENBAUM, FEI WANG, ALEO MOK, and MATTHEW JOHN DOYLE Appeal 2019-004062 Application 14/600,107 Technology Center 2800 Before BEVERLY A. FRANKIN, N. WHITNEY N. WILSON, and MONTÉ T. SQUIRE, Administrative Patent Judges. FRANKLIN, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–25, which constitute all the claims pending in this application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We AFFIRM. 1 We use the word Appellant to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a). Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Fresenius Medical Care Holding, Inc. Appeal Br. 2. Appeal 2019-004062 Application 14/600,107 2 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER Claim 1 is illustrative of Appellant’s subject matter on appeal and is set forth below: 1. A method for remotely monitoring a medical treatment, comprising: executing a remote monitoring application on a remote interface device; receiving data, using the remote monitoring application, concerning the medicaltreatment being performed with a medical device; setting a first limit using the remote monitoring application, wherein the first limit is a limit for a treatment parameter measuring during the medical treatment that is reached before a second limit set at the medical device for the treatment parameter is reached; indicating with an indicator on the remote interface device when the first limit is reached; and in response to the indicator on the remote interface device, initiating a remedial action in connection with the treatment parameter before the second limit is reached at the medical device. REFERENCES The prior art relied upon by the Examiner is: Name Reference Date Thompson US 2001/0027331 Al Oct. 4, 2001 Defaix et al. (“Defaix”) US 2004/0133444 A1 July 8, 2004 Doyle US 2009/0030729 Al Jan. 29, 2009 Kamen et al. (“Kamen”) US 2014/0180711 A1 June 26, 2014 Appeal 2019-004062 Application 14/600,107 3 REJECTIONS 1. Claims 1–5, 7–9, 11–16, 18–20, and 22–25 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. §103 as being unpatentable over Kamen, in further view of Defaix. 2. Claims 6 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. §103 as being unpatentable over Kamen and Defaix, in further view of Doyle. 3. Claims 10 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. §103 as being unpatentable over Kamen and Defaix, in further view of Thompson. OPINION Appellant does not make separate arguments in support of patentability of any particular claim or claim grouping. Accordingly, the claims subject to each ground of rejection will stand or fall with claim 1. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(iv). Thus, our determination made with regard to Rejection 1 is dispositive for Rejections 2 and 3. Upon consideration of the evidence and each of the respective positions set forth in the record, we find that the preponderance of evidence supports the Examiner’s findings and conclusion that the subject matter of Appellants’ claims is unpatentable over the applied art. Accordingly, we sustain each of the Examiner’s rejections on appeal essentially for the reasons set forth in the Final Office Action and in the Answer. We add the following for emphasis. Appellant respectfully submits that the combination of Kamen and Defaix does not show, teach, or suggest a feature of claim 1 of a first limit that is only settable on a remote interface device. Appeal Br. 19. The Examiner proposes to modify the teachings of Kamen (that drug limits may be defined using a carefully controlled process) with the description in Appeal 2019-004062 Application 14/600,107 4 Defaix (that modifications to versioned files may only be made by a central server), to arrive at this claimed feature. Final Act. 4–8. Appellant argue that modifying Kamen according to Defaix as proposed by the Examiner renders Kamen unsatisfactory for its intended purpose of providing patient medical care for the reasons set forth therein. Appeal Br. 19. We are unpersuaded by this line of argument for the reasons provided by the Examiner on pages 4–5 of the Answer. Therein, the Examiner correctly states that modifying the system of Kamen to only allow for DAL file changes to be made at the server would allow for both the mitigation of problems caused by concurrent modifications at the client side and have the additional advantage of preventing unqualified personnel and unqualified patients from making harmful changes at the client side. This would benefit how patient medical care is provided. Beginning on page 20 of the Appeal Brief, Appellant argues that the Kamen discloses that medical devices may be programmed remotely or locally, including being overridden, by clinicians and other users of the medical device. Appellant submits that even if it were proper to combine Kamen and Defaix to produce a system in which one component serves as a centralized server that makes all of the changes to DAI files for a medical device, this would not result in the feature of claim 1 of a first setting for a treatment parameter that is only settable on a remote interface device. Appeal Br. 20. Appellant argues that, rather, it would only mean that one centralized device would be making all of the changes to DAL flies or other settings; but that the changes could still be set on the medical device 26 of Kamen itself, as well as at another location in the same facility 82 of the medical device of Kamen, or remotely via cloud services 83 of the system Appeal 2019-004062 Application 14/600,107 5 81. Id. We are unpersuaded by this line of argument for the reasons provided by the Examiner on pages 7–8 of the Answer. Therein, the Examiner correctly finds that Kamen’s disclosure related to overrides and teaches that its system will not allow overrides to be performed in certain situations. Kamen, ¶¶ [0461–0466, 0789, 1254–1260] (related to “hard limits”). The Examiner states that Kamen discloses that in some situations a second user must approve an override request. Kamen, ¶¶ [1254–1260]. The Examiner states that moreover, Kamen contemplates that a select group of people (¶ [0441]) would be the ones defining the drug limits and that doing so should be “carefully controlled” (¶ [0441]). The Examiner further finds, therefore, that Kamen recognizes the need to restrict how changes and overrides can be entered, although it does not explicitly disclose having a first limit which is only settable on a remote interface device. Ans. 7. The Examiner states that the secondary reference of Defaix addresses the analogous problem of restricting appropriate changes in a similarly networked computer system. Ans. 7. The Examiner states that Defaix explicitly teaches that inappropriate client side updates are blocked by the server (¶ [0035]: “If the client 300 is not allowed to check in the new version, then the central server 100 informs the client 300 through the proxy 200 that its update is not allowed.’). Ans. 7–8. As such, the Examiner states that the modifications are “only settable on the remote interface device” (i.e., the server computer) as the client side devices are prevented from having such functionality in order to avoid conflicts. Ans. 8. The Examiner explains that the medical devices 101 of Kamen are shown to reside at hospital network 82, and not at data center 83 in Figure 4. Ans. 8. Appeal 2019-004062 Application 14/600,107 6 The Examiner thus reiterates that as presented in the statement of the rejection, it would have been obvious in view of the teachings of these references to manage the DAL file in Kamen such that it can only be edited at the cloud services databases 83, in order to prevent tampering with the drug limits by people who are not authorized to do so (i.e. nurses or patients at the medical device itself). Ans. 8. We agree. Lastly, Appellant argues that one would not have been motivated to make the central servers remote interface to a medical device. Appeal Br. 21. Appellant argues that one would not have been motivated to make the central server of Defaix a remote user interface of the medical device 26 of Kamen. Appellant submits that in Defaix, the central server is not being used as an interface to something else, let alone a medical device. Rather, the central server arbitrates requests for file revisions from remote clients 300, using conventional access control for collaborative software development. Defaix, ¶ [0035]. Appeal Br. 21. Appellant submits that thus, one would not have been motivated to make the central server of Defaix a remote interface to the medical device 26 of Kamen. Id. We are unpersuaded by this line of argument for the reason stated by the Examiner on page 9 of the Answer. Therein, the Examiner states that Figure 4 of Kamen depicts communications between hospital network 82 and data center 83 by way of firewalls 100/103. The Examiner states that data center 83 thus constitutes a “remote interface device” under a reasonably-broad interpretation of that term (the Examiner notes that Appellant’s Specification teaches a “remote interface device” in “network 120” that “may include one or more databases or other stores of information Appeal 2019-004062 Application 14/600,107 7 that securely contain medical information” in Appellant’s Figure 2 and on page 10 at lines 15–18 of the Specification. Ans. 9. We agree. Appellant’s arguments in the Reply Brief are unpersuasive for the same reasons that Appellant arguments are unpersuasive in the principal brief. In view of the above, we affirm Rejection 1–3. CONCLUSION We affirm the Examiner’s decision. DECISION SUMMARY In summary: Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1–5, 7–9, 11–16, 18–20, 22–25 103 Kamen, Defaix 1–5, 7–9, 11–16, 18–20, 22–25 6, 17 Kamen, Defaix, Thompson, Doyle 6, 17 10, 21 Kamen, Defaix, Thompson 10, 21 TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv). AFFIRMED Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation