IMPLANTABLE ELECTRODE CONNECTOR DEVICE

• US 3,718,134 A
• Filed: 04/13/1971
• Issued: 02/27/1973
• Est. Priority Date: 04/17/1970
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Giles Skey Brindley
• Original Assignee: Giles Skey Brindley
• Inventors: Brindley, Giles Skey
• Primary Examiner(s): Gaudet, Richard A.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Frinks, Ronald L.
• Application Number:
  US05/133,692
• Time in Patent Office: 686 Days
• Field of Search: 128/404,418,2.1E,DIG.26 3/1 174/97,138R,175
• US Class Current: 600/378
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2/00 Filters implantable into blood vessels; Prostheses, i.e. artificial substitutes or replacements for parts of the body; Appliances for connecting them with the body; Devices providing patency to, or preventing collapsing of, tubular structures of the body, e.g. stents as cosmetic articles, see the relevant subclasses, e.g. wigs, hair pieces, A41G3/00, A41G5/00; artificial nails A45D31/00; dental prostheses A61C13/00; materials for prostheses A61L27/00; artificial hearts A61M60/00; artificial kidneys A61M1/14

Abstract

This proposal concerns a prosthesis, for a paraplegic with severed spinal cord, which operates by picking up motor signals from the still active nervous system and transmitting the same to stimulate spinal roots in the otherwise inactive part of the system, thereby bridging the lession. More particularly for this purpose, the invention proposes an implantable electrode connector device of flexible electrically insulating material having a base from which an array of leaves extend in a successive face-to-face array in the manner of a book, the leaves being resilient and tending to adopt a closed book configuration. In use of such a device, selected spinal roots are connected in the inter-leaf spaces with electrodes conveying appropriate motor signals.

Claims

1. An implantable, electrode connector, prosthetic device of flexible, electrically insulating material comprising:

an elongate base part, and a plurality of arrays of generally leaflike parts extending from said base part, each of said leaf-like parts being aligned in the longitudinal direction of said base part, the leaf-like parts of each array being disposed in a sequence extending traversely across said base part in successive face-to-face disposition in the manner of the pages of a book, said leaf-like parts being resilient and tending to adopt a closed book configuration for each array, and said arrays being disposed in mutually spaced sequence along said longitudinal direction.

2. A device according to claim 1 wherein said leaf-like parts extend from one surface portion of said base part, and said base part is provided with respective bores leading from the opposite surface portion thereof into the spaces between adjacent ones of said leaf-like parts.

3. A device according to claim 1 wherein each of said leaf-like parts has a thickened peripheral portion remote from said base part to define with the remainder of the relevant part, an adjacent leaf-like part, and said base part, a tunnel-like cavity.

4. A device according to claim 1 wherein said base part is of strip form and each of said leaf-like parts is in the form of a substantially rectangular leaf extending from a common major surface of said base part.

5. A device according to claim 4 wherein each of said leaves has a thickened peripheral portion remote from said base part.