Orthopedic staple and related instruments
AssigneeWright Medical Technology, Inc.
InventorsVinay D. PATEL, George Matthew AWTREY, Robert Michael CARLO, III
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method to remove a memory metal orthopedic staple from that is implanted in a bone repair site is disclosed. The orthopedic staple is in its relaxed state and the method includes (a) attaching an inserter tool/cartridge assembly to the orthopedic staple's bridge portion; (b) actuating the inserter tool to change the orthopedic staple from its relaxed state to its insertion state in which the two legs of the orthopedic staple are substantially parallel to each other; and (c) removing the orthopedic staple from the bone repair site.
Claims22
A staple holding cartridge for releasably holding an orthopedic bone staple, the cartridge comprising:
- an outer frame including a base portion and two guiding towers extending upward from the base portion, wherein the two guiding towers are spaced apart for receiving and guiding a staple inserter;
- an inner frame configured to releasably hold a bone staple having a pair of spaced-apart legs separated by a bridge, the inner frame arranged to maintain the bone staple in a biased insertion shape, the inner frame comprising:
- a base portion having two recesses each sized and oriented to receive one of the pair of spaced-apart legs of the bone staple;
- a pair of restraining arms extending upward from the base portion of the inner frame, each restraining arm having a distal end;
- and
- a restraining tab located at the distal end of each restraining arm, wherein each restraining tab projects inwardly toward the other restraining tab so that together the restraining tabs engage and brace against the bridge portion of the bone staple to prevent the bone staple from returning to a unbiased relaxed shape.
A universal staple inserter for inserting orthopedic bone staples of varying sizes, the universal staple inserter comprising:
- a body configured to be received between spaced-apart guiding towers of a staple holding cartridge;
- two pairs of staple grabbers, each pair of staple grabbers comprising two arms extending downward from the body, wherein the two arms of each pair are positioned on opposed sides of the body;
- retaining tabs located at leading ends of each pair of staple grabbers, wherein the retaining tabs extend downward beyond the body and have a wedge shape configured to cam apart upon encountering a bridge portion of a bone staple located within the staple holding cartridge and snap back to capture the bridge portion.
A bone staple comprising:
- a pair of legs, each leg having a proximal end and a distal end, the pair of legs defining a compression plane;
- a non-linearly extending bridge portion including spaced-apart ends connecting the proximal ends of the pair of legs;
- a flat portion that spans a distance between the proximal ends of the pair of legs;
- and
- wherein each of the spaced-apart ends of the bridge portion connect a flat portion to the proximal ends of each leg, wherein the spaced-apart ends of the bridge portion extend laterally between the flat portion and the proximal ends of the legs, whereby the flat portion is off-set from the compression plane, wherein the flat portion has a width that is greater than its thickness.
A staple inserter tool for inserting bone staples having an offset bridge, the staple inserter
- tool comprising:
- a working portion having a channel sized and shaped for receiving and holding a bone staple having an offset U-shaped bridge, wherein the channel is sized to receive the offset U-shaped bridge so as to securely hold the bone staple by an interference fit;
- a slider configured to be manipulated by a user;
- and
- a cam operatively connected to the slider, wherein the slider is configured to slide the cam at least one of toward and away from the U-shaped bridge held in the channel;
- wherein when the cam is pushed toward and engages the U-shaped bridge as the cam generates a lateral urging force against the U-shaped bridge to deform the bone staple from an unbiased relaxed shape to a biased insertion shape.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.