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US 4,126,924 AGranted
Socket and joint prostheses
AssigneeGeneral Atomic Company
InventorsRobert J. Akins, Victor Slivenko
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Pyrolytic carbon artificial socket prostheses for permanent or prolonged implantation in a living body, and methods for making such prostheses. The prostheses comprise a suitably shaped socket element substrate having a hemispherical socket cup, a compression-loaded hemispherical carbon shell mounted in said cup, and a vapor deposited carbon coating (including carbon-carbon alloys) on the substrate-carbon shell assembly.
Claims1
A method for manufacturing socket prostheses for permanent or prolonged implantation in a living body, comprising the steps of
- depositing a carbon shell on a hemispherical substrate form at elevated temperature, said deposited carbon shell having a coefficient of thermal expansion less than that of said substrate,
- cooling said substrate form and said carbon shell deposited thereon to place said shell under compressive strain,
- mounting said hemispherical substrate form and compressively strained shell in a hemispherical socket cavity of a suitably shaped socket element substrate,
- removing said substrate form from said carbon shell to provide a socket element substrate-carbon shell assembly having said carbon shell as a socket bearing element, and
- depositing a carbon coating on said socket element substrate-shell assembly.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.