Appeal No. 1999-0369
Application No. 08/575,926
Independent claims 1 and 19 each call for an absorbent
article having a rear portion including a rear edge, and a
rear waist flap “extending from the vicinity of said rear edge
of said rear portion . . . to thereby define a rear reservoir
between said rear waist flap and said rear portion.” Each of
these claims also calls for a spacer mounted to at least one
of said rear portion and said rear waist flap “effectively
occupying space in said rear reservoir.” Independent claim 34
defines the reservoir in similar language, but requires that
the spacer is disposed at at least one of said rear portion
and said rear waist flap, and “spac[es] said rear waist flap
from said rear portion . . . by the thickness of said spacer.”
In attempting to read appellants’ claims on Roe, the
examiner equates Roe’s liner 38 to the claimed spacer. In
particular, the examiner posits that “the liner 38 can be
considered the spacer and the spacer 30 can be considered to
be the rear waist flap” (answer, page 6). We do not agree.
While we appreciate that during patent prosecution claims
should be given there broadest reasonable interpretation, we
can think of no circumstances under which the above noted
limitations of the independent claims can be fairly read on
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