Appeal No. 1998-2637 Page 9
Application No. 08/470,142
subject matter of claim 57, from which it depends, and with regard to claim 57, Taricco
suffers from the same inadequacy as Lee, in that the piercing is accomplished solely by
the wire (trocar). While Taricco does disclose an expandable portion in the sheath, the
teachings of the two references nevertheless fail to meet the terms of claim 62, and the
rejection will not be sustained.
The same situation exists with claims 73-75, and we will not sustain the rejection
with regard to them, either.
(4)
Independent claim 70 and dependent claims 71, 72, 76-78 and 80 have been
rejected as being unpatentable over Grayzel in view of Lee. The examiner is of the view
that Grayzel discloses all of the subject matter recited in claim 70 except for the wires, but
that it would have been obvious to add reinforcing wires to the Grayzel device in view of the
teachings of Lee.
Grayzel discloses a removable and expandable sheath fabricated from a semi-stiff
plastic which is used to pierce the side wall of a vessel to establish access for a cannula
(column 2, lines 28-41). Grayzel does not disclose or teach that the cannula, or the sheath,
for that matter, encloses a plurality of wires, as is required by the first step of claim 70.
Grayzel also does not disclose or teach piercing the side wall of a blood vessel with a
leading end portion of the cannula and, during performance of that step, moving the sheath
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