Appeal No. 2004-0327
Application No. 09/689,194
of the invention. Scripps Clinic & Research Found. v. Genentech
Inc., 927 F.2d 1565, 1576, 18 USPQ2d 1001, 1010 (Fed. Cir. 1991).
Independent claim 1 recites an adhesive bandage adapted to
be applied to a user’s skin wound. The claim requires the
bandage to comprise, inter alia, a pad portion and an adhesive
portion on the rear surface of the backing layer. As
persuasively argued by the appellant (see, for example, pages 6
through 8 in the main brief), Hasse does not teach such a
bandage. To begin with, a person of ordinary skill in the art
would not consider Hasse’s sanitary napkin to be an adhesive
bandage adapted to be applied to a user’s skin wound. The
examiner’s reasoning to the contrary (see page 4 in the answer)
is, at best, quite strained. A person of ordinary skill in the
art also would not view Hasse’s pad portion (absorbent core 28)
and adhesive portion (adhesive layer 90), which lie on opposite
surfaces of backsheet 26, to be on the rear surface of a backing
layer. The examiner’s interpretation of Hasse’s topsheet 24 and
backsheet 26 as collectively composing a backing layer wherein
the backsheet 26 is the rear surface thereof (see page 5 in the
answer) rests on an unreasonable interpretation of both the Hasse
disclosure, which clearly indicates that the topsheet and
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