Ex Parte Buttner et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 21, 2018

12625324 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 21, 2018)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
12/625,324 11/24/2009
91065 7590 09/25/2018
Epic
c/o Boyle Fredrickson S.C.
840 North Plankinton A venue
Milwaukee, WI 53203
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Mark D. Buttner
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
ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
E09324US (1517.049) 1020
EXAMINER
LUBIN, VALERIE
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3626
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/25/2018 ELECTRONIC
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.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
docketing@boylefred.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte MARK D. BUTTNER, DANIEL J. DONOGHUE,
DAVID E. FUHRMANN, JANET L. CAMPBELL, and
BRIAN M. WEISBERGER
Appeal2017-006955 1
Application 12/625,3242
Technology Center 3600
Before HUBERT C. LORIN, BRADLEY B. BAY AT, and
MATTHEWS. MEYERS, Administrative Patent Judges.
BAY AT, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the decision to reject
claims 1-18 as set forth in the Final Office Action ("Final Act.") mailed on
June 8, 2016. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We REVERSE.
1 Our Decision references Appellants' Appeal Brief ("App. Br.," filed
Nov. 8, 2016), Reply Brief ("Reply Br.," filed Mar. 31, 2017), and the
Examiner's Answer ("Ans.," mailed Feb. 2, 2017).
2 Appellants identify the real party in interest as "Epic Systems
Corporation." App. Br. 3.
Appeal2017-006955
Application 12/625,324
CLAIMED INVENTION
Appellants' "invention relates generally to electronic medical records
and in particular to a system that simplifies the communication of electronic
medical records among healthcare institutions involved in a patient's
healthcare." Spec. ,r 2. Claim 1 reproduced below with added emphasis, is
illustrative of the subject matter on appeal.
1. A computer implemented system for transferring clinical medical
data between healthcare institutions, comprising:
a first electronic medical record system configured to maintain
electronic medical records for a patient at a first healthcare
institution, the system including a user interface receiving user
identification and authentication information to identify a user as a
patient and log the user into the electronic medical record of the
patient allowing the user to select medical record information for
display in the user interface;
an interactive web browser integrated into the user inteiface
such that it can only be launched from within the user interface after
successfully logging into the electronic medical record of the patient
in the first electronic medical record system, the interactive
web browser configured to receive a web-based portal page selection
from a patient after the interactive web browser has been launched,
where the portal selection allows the patient at the first healthcare
institution to connect to a web-based portal page of a second
electronic medical record system at a second healthcare institution
and select medical record information from a second electronic
medical record of the patient at the second healthcare institution for
display in the interactive web browser, the functionality of the
interactive web browser being constrained based on information in
the first electronic medical record, wherein the web-based portal
page is configured to provide medical record information from the
second electronic medical record of the patient from the second
electronic medical record system to be displayed through the
integrated interactive web browser; and
a medical record parser configured to parse the displayed
information for storage in the first electronic medical record system.
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Application 12/625,324
REJECTIONS
The following rejections are before us for review:
Claims 1-8, 10-16, and 18 are rejected underpre-AIA 35 U.S.C.
I03(a) as being unpatentable over Kerstna (US 2010/0328320 Al, pub. Dec.
30, 2010) and Moshfeghi (US 6,476,833 Bl, iss. Nov. 5, 2002).
Claims 9 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. I03(a) as being
unpatentable over Kerstna, Moshfeghi, and Cohen (US 7,627,334 B2, iss.
Dec. 1, 2009).
ANALYSIS
In contesting the obviousness rejection of claims 1 and 11, Appellants
contend that neither Kerstna nor Moshfeghi alone or in combination teach or
suggest the limitation "an interactive web browser integrated into the user
interface such that it can only be launched from within the user interface ( of
the recited first electronic medical record system) after successfully logging
into the electronic medical record of the patient in the first electronic
medical record system." App. Br. 13. In particular, Appellants argue:
Moshfeghi merely teaches an embedded and constrained browser
that is unrelated to being within the user interface to an access
restricted medical record. Applicants respectfully assert that it is
improper to parse the claim to remove this portion of the
limitation and cite a reference that teaches a generic embedded
and constrained browser that is not particular to the interface
from which it is launched.
Id. at 14.
Responding to Appellants' argument the
Examiner states that Kerstna does not specifically disclose the
web browser is integrated into the user interface such that it can
only be launched from within the user interface of the recited first
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Application 12/625,324
electronic medical record system after successfully logging into
the electronic medical record of the patient, however, Examiner
relies on Moshfeghi to show the teaching of the browser being
integrated into the user interface such that it can only be launched
from within the user interface, which is a constrained browser
( Col. 3 lines 10-13 "This is achieved by embedded browser
functionality that can be activated to display an embedded
browser sub-window inside the main application window").
Ans. 5.
In their Reply Brief, Appellants assert:
Even combined Kerstna and Moshfeghi do not teach or suggest
such a system and the Examiner has not made a prima facie
showing of obviousness. Using "an interactive web browser for
logging into the electronic medical record of a patient" (Kerstna)
with a "browser being integrated into the user interface such that
it can only be launched from within the user Interface"
(Moshfeghi) does not teach or suggest Appellants invention. The
combination would merely result in a user interface integrated
web browser that can he used to log into an electronic medical
record system. In contrast, Appellant's invention "leverages the
security and information in a first electronic medical system to
facilitate access to utilization of information in the second
electronic medical system and to display the information from
the second electronic medical system in a browser within the first
electronic medical system. There is nothing in the cited art or the
Examiner's arguments that address all the limitations in the
claims, individually or collectively, nor that would provide the
advantages of the invention.
Reply Br. 4.
We are persuaded that a prima facie case of obviousness has not been
established.
Although Moshfeghi teaches a web browser integrated into the user
interface such that it can only be launched from within the user interface,
independent claims 1 and 11 also require that the integrated browser can
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Application 12/625,324
only be launched "after successfully logging into the electronic medical
record of the patient in the first electronic medical record system." App. Br.,
Claims App 'x. In other words, the claimed integrated browser can only be
launched from within the user interface after successfully logging into the
electronic medical record of the patient in the electronic medical system.
The difficulty with the Examiner's rejection is that the conditional
requirement for launching the integrated browser has been divorced from the
claim limitation. The rejection of claims 1 and 11 provides that this
conditional limitation is found in Kerstna (see Final Act. 4--5, 8), but the
Examiner in response to Appellants' arguments acknowledges that Kerstna
does not disclose this disputed limitation (see supra). Instead, the Examiner
relies on Moshfeghi's teaching at column 3, lines 10-13. See Ans. 5.
Moshfeghi describes "methods and apparatus for browsing markup
language documents from within the context of an executing application."
Moshfeghi 3:8-10. According to Moshfeghi, embedded browser
functionality can be activated to display an embedded browser sub-window
inside the main application window, such that "some users are allowed
access to any resource on the public internet or private intranets, while other
users can only access the limited lists of resources set forth in the content of
their user profile." Moshfeghi 3:10-18. "Further, the functionality and
appearance of the user interface of the embedded browser sub-window is
also configured from information in the user profile. The administrator of
the system in which an application according to this invention is installed
can change the resource access and browsing function privileges of users by
editing the content of their user profiles." Moshfeghi 3: 18-25. Moshfeghi
teaches that access to resources and browsing function privileges associated
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Application 12/625,324
with an embedded browser sub-window are based on the user profile, which
indicates "whether the user has unrestricted or restricted network access
from the embedded browser functionality." Moshfeghi 8:37-39. Thus,
Moshfeghi discloses that access to resources and browsing privileges of an
embedded browser sub-window are dictated by a user profile, but the
embedded browser sub-window is launched without the requirement of the
claimed condition. In other words, the rejection of record has not identified
any teaching in Moshfeghi or provided a rationale to account for the
required condition of launching a web browser integrated within the user
interface only after successfully logging into the electronic medical record
of the patient in the first electronic medical record system, as called for in
claims 1 and 11. As such, a prima facie case of obviousness has not
established as to claims 1 and 11.
Accordingly, we do not sustain the rejection of independent claims 1
and 11 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), as well as dependent claims 2-8, 10, 12-
16, and 18. Cf In re Fritch, 972 F.2d 1260, 1266 (Fed. Cir. 1992)
("dependent claims are nonobvious if the independent claims from which
they depend are nonobvious."). We also do not sustain the rejection of
dependent claims 9 and 1 7 because the Examiner does not rely on Cohen to
cure the deficiency of Moshfeghi. See Final Act. 10-11.
DECISION
The decision to reject claims 1-18 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) is
reversed.
REVERSED
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