Appeal No. 2000-0472
Application No. 08/868,536
catheter is in place (col. 5, lines 2 to 5 and 49 to 53).
After reviewing the record in light of the appellants'
brief and reply brief, the final rejection and the examiner's
answer, we conclude that the § 103 rejection is not well
taken. The examiner does not identify which embodiment of the
Folden apparatus is relied upon, but assuming that tubing 114,
322 and/or 372 constitutes a catheter, we do not consider that
one of ordinary skill would have found it obvious to utilize a
connector such as disclosed by Folden to connect Groshong's
connector 30 and catheter 10. In the Groshong apparatus, the
end 20 of the catheter is inserted into a bore in connector
30; this would be somewhat analogous, in Folden, to tube (male
member) 112 inserted into the bore of body (female member) 16
(Fig. 3), or male member 376 inserted into the bore of female
member 320 (Fig. 5). However, in Folden's embodiments, the
threaded collar 120 or 378 is on the member being inserted
(male member) rather than on the female member. Therefore, if
one of ordinary skill were to modify Groshong in view of
Folden, the threaded collar (sleeve) would be carried on the
catheter (male member) rather than on the connector 30 (female
member), which is contrary to claim 14's recitation that the
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