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AssigneeMedela Holding AG
InventorsKrzysztof Wajtryt, Jakub Piotr Pawlowski, Daria Schelling, Beda Weber, Romana Gander
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A breast pump shaped at least in part to fit inside a bra and comprising a housing including an aggregate, a breast shield element including a nipple tunnel adapted to receive a nipple, and a milk container adapted to contain a predetermined amount of expressed milk, wherein the breast shield element and the milk container are detachable from the housing. The present invention proposes an aggregate including a piston adapted to reciprocate within the housing, which piston moves the membrane. In the method expressed milk flows from a nipple chamber, which when the breast shield element is laid against a breast is defined in the nipple tunnel between a free end of the nipple tunnel and the breast, through the milk outlet valve into the pumping chamber and from the pumping chamber through the container valve into the milk chamber.
A breast pump shaped at least in part to fit inside a bra and comprising a housing including an aggregate drivingly coupled with a membrane, a breast shield element including a nipple tunnel adapted to receive a nipple, and a milk container adapted to contain a predetermined amount of expressed milk, wherein the breast shield element and the milk container are detachable from the housing and wherein the membrane is detachable sealed against the housing, wherein the aggregate comprises a piston adapted to reciprocate within the housing, which piston moves the membrane, the pump comprising a pumping chamber defined in part by the membrane, which pumping chamber is in fluid communication with the nipple tunnel, the membrane being releasably received between the milk container and the housing such that the membrane is arranged opposite to the piston, and the membrane and a drive end side of the piston are arranged in a clamp space, which is sealed to prevent ambient air from entering into the clamp space as the piston pulls the membrane towards the housing to expand a pumping chamber.
A method for operating a breast pump shaped at least in part to fit inside a bra and comprising a housing including an aggregate, a breast shield element including a nipple tunnel adapted to receive a nipple, and a milk container defining a milk chamber adapted to contain a predetermined amount of expressed milk, wherein a pumping chamber is defined within the breast pump, a pumping chamber volume thereof being variable by a moveable membrane, wherein a milk outlet valve is provided between nipple tunnel and the pumping chamber and wherein a container valve is provided between the pumping chamber and the milk chamber, in which method when the breast shield element is laid against a breast a nipple chamber is defined in the nipple tunnel between a free end of the nipple tunnel and the breast, in which method expressed milk flows from the nipple chamber through the milk outlet valve into the pumping chamber and from the pumping chamber through the container valve into the milk chamber, wherein at commencement of pumping air is sucked out of the nipple chamber and the pumping chamber and transferred into the milk chamber, which air is released out of the milk chamber to ambient and that expressed milk replaces the air in the nipple chamber and in the pumping chamber and which milk builds a hydraulic coupling between the breast and the membrane such that movement of the membrane will be hydraulically transmitted to the breast inside the nipple tunnel.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.