ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 24 -- United States Patent no. 12,582,440, issued on March 24, was assigned to Intuitive Surgical Operations Inc. (Sunnyvale, Calif.).
"Instrument entry guide" was invented by Jeffrey R. Roeder (Alameda, Calif.) and Erasmo A. Lopez Calleros (Fremont, Calif.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Disclosed are medical devices for surgical procedures, especially procedures that involve the manipulation of surgical instrument end effectors close to the skin surface at an incision site. In accordance with some embodiments, an instrument access device is configured to couple to a wound retractor at a distal end of the device and to receive a multiple instrument entry guide in a port...