ALEXANDRIA, Va., Nov. 3 -- United States Patent no. 12,778,403, issued on Nov. 3, was assigned to Covidien LP (Mansfield, Mass.).
"Endoscope cleaning device" was invented by Weijiang Ding (Shanghai), Syed Sarfraz Ahamed (Shanghai) and Kai Huang (Shanghai).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A cleaning device (100) enables cleaning of a lens (18) of an endoscope (10) during a surgical procedure to maintain a clear image without having to remove the endoscope (10) from the patient's body. The cleaning device (100) includes a suction ring (500) that selectively encloses the lens (18) of the endoscope (10) and retains the cleaning fluid during cleaning of the lens (18)."
The patent was filed on Aug. 1...