US Patent Issued to Covidien on June 2 for "Trocar for cleaning medical devices therein" (Chinese Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 2 -- United States Patent no. 12,642,556, issued on June 2, was assigned to Covidien LP (Mansfield, Mass.).

"Trocar for cleaning medical devices therein" was invented by Weijiang Ding (Shanghai), Syed Sarfraz Ahamed (Shanghai), Kai Huang (Shanghai) and Kaizhi Zhang (Shanghai).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A trocar (10) is provided which permits cleaning of a medical device herein. In aspects, the trocar (10) has a seal (50) at a distal portion of the trocar (10). In use, a medical device, such as a laparoscope (200), passes through the seal (50) at the distal portion of the trocar (10). To clean a lens (210) at the end of the laparoscope (200), a vacuum is applied to the...