U.S. Patent 7766821 was awarded to Henke-Sass, Wolf GmbH on 2010-08-03 and describes a “Bendable portion of an insertion tube of an endoscope and method of producing it.” This patent has been cited 296 times by other U.S. patents which places it in the top 500 cited patents since 2010 according to our law firm research, and makes it of the most innovative medical technology patents in the field of instruments. The abstract states:

A bendable portion, which is arranged at the distal end of an insertion tube of an endoscope, comprises a plurality of tube segments, each of said tube segments having connecting means that cooperate with the connecting means of the adjacent tube segment, as well as control wires that can control the bending of the bendable portion. The respective connecting means of a tube segment are provided such that they axially protrude from the faces of the tube segment and are located within the mantle of the tube segment and such that they do not exceed the thickness of the mantle. The connecting means, which are provided on the respective faces of adjacent tube segments and which are located opposite each other, complement each other in the manner of a hinge-type connection. Link: U.S. Patent 7766821

This patent was originally filed on 2005-06-08 which gives it a processing time of 1882 days, compared to an average processing time of 1855 in the field. Henke-Sass, Wolf GmbH has 32 total patents. The first named inventor is Thomas J. Simon of Rockledge, FL. The primary examiner was Linda C Dvorak.

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