ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 26 -- United States Patent no. 12,257,205, issued on March 25, was assigned to PHYSIO-CONTROL INC. (Redmond, Wash.).

"Preventing infections in non-sterile air-circulating medical devices" was invented by Erik von Schenck (Lomma, Sweden), Cathlene Buchanan (Shoreline, Wash.), Neal Clark (Snohomish, Wash.) and Tyson Taylor (Bothell, Wash.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "The present disclosure includes various examples for cooling electronics within a medical device while preventing or reducing the risk of an interior of the medical device being contaminated with a pathogen. The present disclosure includes a medical device having an air deflector to deflect potentially cont...