U.S. Patent 7918848 was awarded to Maquet Cardiovascular LLC on 2011-04-05 and describes a “Tissue welding and cutting apparatus and method.” This patent has been cited 290 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 surgical apparatus and methods for severing and welding tissue, in particular blood vessels, include a pair of relatively movable jaws at a distal end of an elongated shaft. A first heating element on one of the jaws is adapted to heat up to a first temperature and form a welded region within the tissue, while a second heating element on one of the jaws is adapted to heat up to a second temperature and sever the tissue within the welded region. A force-limiting mechanism is provided to limit the pressure applied to the tissue by the jaws to ensure that the tissue is severed and the ends effectively welded within a short amount of time. Link: U.S. Patent 7918848

This patent was originally filed on 2005-03-25 which gives it a processing time of 2202 days, compared to an average processing time of 1942 in the field. Maquet Cardiovascular LLC has 95 total patents. The first named inventor is Liming Lau of Mountain View, CA. The primary examiner was Lee S Cohen.

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