US Patent Issued to INTUITIVE SURGICAL OPERATIONS on July 1 for "Systems and methods for sensing presence of medical tools" (California, New York Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 3 -- United States Patent no. 12,343,221, issued on July 1, was assigned to INTUITIVE SURGICAL OPERATIONS INC. (Sunnyvale, Calif.).

"Systems and methods for sensing presence of medical tools" was invented by Andrey Polonsky (Rochester, N.Y.), Eric J. Earnst (Saratoga, Calif.), Jean-Marc Gery (Los Angeles), Andrew J. Hazelton (San Carlos, Calif.) and Sarah A. Nichols (Santa Clara, Calif.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A system including a tool recognition assembly comprising a first target reader with a first detection zone. The system also includes a tool configured to be installed in the tool recognition assembly, wherein the first reader detects a first reading indicat...