Invalidity dossier
US 3675657
Tourniquet
Current assignee: CLEBEL Inc L ANGE GARDIEN CO R
Added 9/23/2026, 5:11:22 PM
Active provider: DeepSeek · deepseek-flash
Patent summary
Title, assignee, inventors, filing/issue dates, abstract, and a plain-language overview of the claims.
Patent Overview — US 3,675,657 A
Title: Tourniquet
Inventor: Oscar Gauthier (Ville Brossard, Province of Quebec, Canada)
Assignee: Clebel Inc., L'Ange-Gardien, Co. Rouville, Quebec, Canada
Application No.: US 841,445
Filing / Priority Date: July 14, 1969
Publication (Grant) Date: July 11, 1972
Status: Expired – Lifetime (anticipated expiration July 11, 1989)
Classification: A61B17/132 (Tourniquets)
Purpose: The device is mounted around a limb to stop bleeding, and is also adaptable for mounting around the male organ to restrict blood circulation and cause erection in an impotent or semi-potent male. Stated objects are: (a) uniform pressure distribution around the limb or organ; (b) easy pressurization and release; (c) positive, safe locking in the closing position; and (d) simple construction and use.
Plain-language scope: A ring has a rigid annular outer support and an inner endless resilient membrane (preferably latex rubber, U-shaped in cross-section) whose lateral edges are secured to the support's lateral edges, together defining a toroidal chamber with a central opening. Inside the chamber, a series of strings (preferably short piano-wire lengths covered with nylon tubing) each have one end fixed to the support and the other end fixed to a toothed annular member mounted for rotation in a guiding groove formed by rings 13, 15, 17, 19, held against rotation by keys. A pinion meshing with the toothed member and operable from outside the ring (via a polygonal key recess) rotates the member, drawing the strings taut so the membrane contracts against its own resiliency into an iris-type closure. A spring-leaf pawl engaging the pinion teeth locks the contracted position, with a releasing button extending through the support; a string seated in a circumferential groove holds the guiding-groove assembly to the support. Six claims are present.
Not established by the supplied excerpt: The full claim text (claims are truncated), complete description and omitted passages, the drawing contents beyond captions and partial descriptions, and any litigation, ownership transfer, validity, or prior-art analysis (citing only U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,073,525; 1,225,000; 2,604,098; 2,882,903, and German 615,801 as background).
Generated 10/1/2026, 9:43:46 PM
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Litigation summary
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PTAB challenges
AIA trial proceedings at the USPTO Patent Trial and Appeal Board — IPR, PGR, and CBM. Petitioners, judge panels, claim-level invalidation outcomes from Final Written Decisions, and Federal Circuit appeals. The single most important defensive datapoint after litigation history.
Assignment history
Inventors, original assignee, and the chain of ownership recorded with the USPTO — including the correspondent attorney who recorded each assignment, since shell-LLC chains often share one repeat-player attorney even when the entity names look unrelated. Surfaces NPE / patent-troll patterns: shell-entity transfers, known asserters in the chain, repeat correspondent fingerprints, pre-litigation assignments, and bankruptcy fire-sales.
Prior art
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Obviousness
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Extensions
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Derivative works
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