Surgical retractor system and clip-on joint clamp
AssigneeThompson Surgical Instruments, Inc.
InventorSteve Nowak
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A joint clamp for a surgical retractor system includes clamps, a cam bolt, and a cam lever. The cam bolt passes through the clamps. A cam lever comprising a cam head pivotally attached an upper portion the cam bolt to permit rotation between a locked position and an unlocked position. The joint clamp may include springs which provide a scissors clamp of the clamps with a clip-on feature in which the scissors clamp may clipped-on and clipped-off an object such as a frame member, table post, or retractor handle. The springs may further prevent or reduce a rising movement of the clamps when the cam lever rotates from an unlocked state to a locked state.
Claims20
A clamp for use with a frame member, the clamp comprising:
- a first clamp portion comprising a first jaw;
- a second clamp portion comprising a second jaw, wherein the second clamp portion is pivotably coupled to the first clamp portion;
- and
- one or more springs that bias the first clamp portion and the second clamp portion toward a resting state;
- wherein the first clamp portion and the second clamp portion define a clamping passage sized to receive the frame member;
- wherein a size of a mouth opening between the first jaw and the second jaw is smaller than a width of the frame member when the first clamp portion and the second clamp portion are in the resting state;
- and
- wherein the one or more springs set a clip-on force that resists pivoting the first clamp portion with respect to the second clamp portion in a direction that increases the size of the mouth opening and permits passage of the frame member through the mouth opening and into the clamping passage.
A system, comprising:
- a longitudinal member having a diameter;
- and
- a clamp comprising a first clamp portion, a second clamp portion, and one or more springs that bias the first clamp portion and the second clamp portion toward a resting state;
- wherein the first clamp portion and the second clamp portion define a clamping passage through which the longitudinal member passes;
- wherein a size of a mouth opening between a first jaw of the first clamp portion and a second jaw of the second clamp portion is smaller than the diameter of the longitudinal member when the first clamp portion and the second clamp portion are in the resting state;
- and
- wherein the one or more springs set a clip-off force required to increase the size of the mouth opening and permit passage of the longitudinal member from the clamping passage through the mouth opening.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.