Patents Assigned to Biotronik CRM Patent AG
  • Patent number: 8315694
    Abstract: Heart monitor for detecting ectopic beats in an input electrocardiogram signal that includes an electrocardiogram signal input and a morphological signal analyzer connected to the electrocardiogram signal input, the analyzer being adapted to generate a first time series of values representing the input electrocardiogram signal, a second signal analyzer adapted to generate generating a modified time series of values representing a trend of values of the first time series and a comparison stage being adapted to compare the first time series with the modified time series to thus detect ectopic beats.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 16, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 20, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Jie Lian, Dirk Muessig
  • Patent number: 8283928
    Abstract: The invention relates to a method and arrangement for determining a power supply state variable, particularly of the maintenance state of a battery or rechargeable battery, in an active medical implant, wherein the power supply is subjected to a predetermined load, and the output voltage thereof is detected multiple times during at least one time segment of the load phase, and the measurement values are subjected to a comparison to a respective comparison value, or the chronological curve of the voltage obtained from the measurement values is subjected to a comparison to at least one comparison curve, wherein the comparison result is considered characteristic for the state variable.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 8, 2010
    Date of Patent: October 9, 2012
    Assignee: BIOTRONIK CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Thomas Doerr, Rainer-Michael Schmidt, Peter Blachut
  • Patent number: 8285246
    Abstract: An electronic implant is designed to detect at least one technical or physiological patient parameter, and has an exhaustible power source. The electronic implant also has an integrated mobile wireless antenna, a low-current mobile wireless modem with a low maximum transmission power, a low-current mobile wireless field-strength-measuring unit, and a control unit connected to the field-strength-measuring unit and to the mobile wireless modem. The control unit triggers access to a mobile wireless network as a function of the transmission power needed for data transmission by the low-current mobile wireless modem, taking into account a mobile wireless field strength value determined by the field-strength-measuring unit, and also taking into account the urgency of the data content to be transmitted. Network access only occurs when the needed transmission power does not exceed a specific maximum value for the particular urgency.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 30, 2009
    Date of Patent: October 9, 2012
    Assignee: BIOTRONIK CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Thomas Doerr
  • Patent number: 8280507
    Abstract: An implantable antitachycardiac cardiac stimulator has at least one right-ventricular sensing unit, a defibrillation shock generator and a control unit, as well as an additional detection unit for detecting ventricular events which operates independently of the right-ventricular detection electrode, and an evaluation unit (e.g., as an additional component of the control unit) which suppresses the delivery of a defibrillation shock on reliable detection of the normal rhythm via the additional detection unit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 10, 2009
    Date of Patent: October 2, 2012
    Assignee: BIOTRONIK CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Thomas Doerr
  • Patent number: 8275459
    Abstract: An implantable arrangement including an implantable electromedical device having an exterior wall and an implantable sensor and/or actuator outside of the exterior wall. The sensor and/or actuator are in signal connection with the implantable device via an electric stage and a mechanical stage arranged in series, wherein the mechanical stage sends and/or receives mechanical vibration signals through the closed exterior wall, and the electrical stage sends and/or receives the same signals in electrical form.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 20, 2009
    Date of Patent: September 25, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Ingo Weiss, Stefan Knorr
  • Patent number: 8271092
    Abstract: A swallowing stimulation system has a swallowing stimulator for use in triggering an act of swallowing in a patient. The swallowing system has an operating unit including operating elements for receiving user inputs, whereby the operating elements are allocated to different possible physical properties of a food, such that a user can allocate a particular food by means of the operating elements to at least one of at least two categories. The operating unit is designed to generate a control signal corresponding to a user input for the swallowing stimulator, and the swallowing stimulator is designed so that a stimulus for triggering an act of swallowing is formed in response to the control signal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 24, 2010
    Date of Patent: September 18, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Jens Philipp
  • Patent number: 8271085
    Abstract: An implantable medical device has an impedance or admittance determination unit, an alternating current or voltage source, a measuring unit, and an analysis unit which is connected to the alternating current or AC voltage source and the measuring unit to calculate an impedance value or an admittance value at different times. The impedance or admittance determination unit may generate measuring current having two different frequencies (preferably below 100 kHz), and the analysis unit may calculate pairs of impedance or admittance values which are chronologically assigned to one another for different frequencies of the measuring current, and calculate a value for a blood impedance or blood admittance component which is independent of the impedance of the body tissue surrounding a particular blood vessel, The analysis unit may also determine trends in this value over time as an indicator for a change of blood hematocrit value.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 8, 2008
    Date of Patent: September 18, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Michael Lippert, Olaf Skerl, Stefan Paule, Bernhard Fahn, Gerald Czygan, Heinrich Reinke, Albrecht Urbaszek
  • Patent number: 8265741
    Abstract: A medical device for processing physiological signals such as electrocardiograms. The processing includes: sampling a physiologic signal in a first channel with a first sampling rate, simultaneously sampling the physiologic signal in a second channel with a higher sampling rate to thus generate pairs of sampling values, forming the difference between two sampling values of each pair, comparing said difference with a threshold, and generating a noise detection indicator whenever said threshold is exceeded.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 23, 2009
    Date of Patent: September 11, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Hollis Whittington, Dirk Muessig, Volker Lang
  • Patent number: 8260420
    Abstract: An electromedical implant having a far-field electrocardiogram detection unit connected or connectable to at least two implantable electrodes, at least one electrode of which is to be placed in the right atrium or right ventricle and is designed to record a far-field electrocardiogram via the terminal for the electrode to be placed in the right atrium or the right ventricle and one other electrode. The far-field electrocardiogram detection unit is connected to a far-field electrocardiogram evaluation unit, which is configured to detect signal features of the far-field electrocardiogram associated with an excitation or contraction of the left atrium and/or the left ventricle of the heart in a far-field electrocardiogram recorded by the far-field electrocardiogram detection unit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 11, 2009
    Date of Patent: September 4, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Ulrich Busch, Andreas Neumann, Ulrich Tietze
  • Patent number: 8255063
    Abstract: The invention relates to an intracardial implantable electrode line for connection to an implantable medical device, in particular a cardiac pacemaker or cardioverter/defibrillator or the like, which has an acceleration sensor in the area of its distal end, which is implemented to record and differentiate acceleration values in at least two different directions. The invention additionally relates to a cardiac stimulation configuration which also has a cardiac stimulator in addition to such an electrode line.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 11, 2008
    Date of Patent: August 28, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Thomas Doerr
  • Patent number: 8250748
    Abstract: An LTCC substrate structure with at least one contact element for connecting a wire conductor, which has a first metallization (20) arranged on and/or in the ceramic substrate for electrical connection to the wire conductor, wherein the first metallization (20) preferably contains silver or a silver alloy. To avoid via posting or a plating process, a diffusion barrier layer covering the first metallization or metal layer, which diffusion barrier layer (22) covering the first metallization (20), which diffusion barrier layer is produced with a locally acting application method, and a second metal layer (24) arranged on the diffusion barrier layer (22) are provided, wherein the second metal layer (24) preferably contains gold and/or platinum and/or an alloy that has at least one of these elements. The invention also discloses a production method for an LTCC substrate structure of this type.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 26, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 28, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Dieter Schwanke, Christian Zeilmann, Michael Krenkel
  • Patent number: 8249690
    Abstract: The invention relates to a brain stimulation electrode line (10) for electric stimulation of the brain areas with an elongated flexible electrode line body (12) having on or near its distal end at least one stimulation electrode (18) designed for delivering electric pulses to surrounding body tissue in the event of use. The brain stimulation electrode line (10) is characterized in that the electrode line body has on its distal end at least one ultrasonic transducer (20), which is arranged so that it can detect reflected ultrasound in a detection range aligned distally along the longitudinal direction of the electrode line body (12).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 18, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 21, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Thomas Doerr
  • Patent number: 8244353
    Abstract: An implantable cardiac stimulator includes a cardioversion/defibrillation unit connected to at least one electrode pair for generation and delivery of cardioversion or defibrillation shocks; an atrial sensing unit detecting atrial contraction, and outputting an atrial sensing signal indicating a atrial event when an atrial contraction is detected; a ventricular sensing unit detecting ventricular contraction, and outputting a ventricular sensing signal when a ventricular contraction is detected; a tachycardia detection unit connected to the atrial and ventricular sensing units and detecting a tachycardia, and classifying it as a ventricular tachycardia (VT) or as a supraventricular tachycardia (SVT); and a treatment control unit designed to trigger at least one atrial cardioversion shock when a ventricular rhythm detected by the ventricular sensing unit is faster than a programmed frequency limit, and the tachycardia detection unit classifies an SVT as an atrial fibrillation (AFib).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 1, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 14, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Thomas Doerr
  • Patent number: 8239025
    Abstract: The invention comprises a system for the secure remote programming of an implant. A TAN server is provided for this purpose, in which a user is first accredited and which then generates a TAN upon a request and provides it to the user on one hand and to a patient intermediate device assigned to the implant to be reprogrammed on the other hand.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 6, 2008
    Date of Patent: August 7, 2012
    Assignee: BIOTRONIK CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Joachim Reinke
  • Patent number: 8239040
    Abstract: An electrode catheter that includes an elongate electrode catheter body having a distal end and a proximal end, at least one electrode pole in the area of the distal end of the electrode body, and at least one supply line, which runs insulated in the electrode body in the main direction (H) from the proximal end to the distal end, to the at least one electrode pole, wherein the at least one supply line is configured to desensitize the electrode catheter to the radiation of an electromagnetic field of an interfering frequency having a specific wavelength(?), with the supply line changing its run direction at least twice in such a way that it runs at least once opposite to the main direction (H), the distance (L1,L2) between two direction changes (R) is shorter than half of the wavelength (?/2) of the interfering frequency.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 28, 2007
    Date of Patent: August 7, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Wolfgang Geistert
  • Patent number: 8239019
    Abstract: An implantable electrostimulation device having at least three input channels, (each forming a sensing channel), which are each connected to at least one electrode or to one terminal for an electrode, using which at least three different electrical potentials accompanying an excitation of cardiac tissue (myocardium) in a heart may be detected. Uses a signal processing unit which is connected to the input channels and is implemented to analyze the time curve of the potentials detected via the three sensing channels as three input signals in chronological relation to a periodically repeating trigger signal, which triggers a time window, and which is also implemented to detect predefined signal features for each of the three input signals within the time window triggered by the trigger signal, store them, and compare them to corresponding signal features of preceding time windows or of another input channel within the same time window.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 10, 2006
    Date of Patent: August 7, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Thomas Dörr, Andreas Kucher, Jens Philipp, Ingo Weiss
  • Patent number: 8210838
    Abstract: A method and device for producing a battery electrode (5) by: pouring a powder mixture quantity (6a) into a cavity (2), laying an electrically conductive diverter (4) on powder mixture (6a), pouring a further quantity (6b) of same powder mixture (6) into same cavity (2), and compressing the two powder mixture quantities (6a, 6b). The device has a filling cavity (2) for powder mixture (6), at least one compression means (1) for compressing powder mixture (6), and support (7) and fixing means (8) for positioning and fixing an electrically conductive diverter (4). The diverter (4) is situated so that partial quantities (6a, 6b) of powder mixture (6) are located above and below diverter (4). The support means (7) and fixing means (8) are situated in such a way that a ratio of the partial quantities (6a, 6b) of powder mixture (6) above and below the diverter (4) remains essentially maintained.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 14, 2010
    Date of Patent: July 3, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Gerd Fehrmann, Thomas Fischer, Thomas Hucke, Roland Staub, Jürgen Drews, Tim Traulsen
  • Patent number: 8209014
    Abstract: A medical implant has at least one interface for bidirectional wireless data exchange, a data memory, and a controller. The controller and interface perform a wireless data exchange with at least two different external devices, resulting in at least two different data communication channels, one channel being assigned to data communication with the programming device and a second channel being assigned to data communication with a central service center. The medical implant is also designed to receive control commands and/or messages over the second channel while the second channel is active, and to recognize received control commands and/or messages intended for a programming device, store them temporarily in a memory (if necessary), and forward them to a programming device via the first channel when the first channel is active.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 16, 2009
    Date of Patent: June 26, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventor: Thomas Doerr
  • Patent number: 8204588
    Abstract: A cardiac pacemaker, defibrillator, or other programmable medical device (25) includes a source unit (15) and a collection unit (20). The source unit (15) has a check data unit (40) generating at least one check datum for control data for the medical device (25), and a transmitting unit (45) transmitting the control data and the check datum to the collection unit (20). The collection unit (20) has a storage unit (65) storing the control data, a check unit (70) checking the integrity of the control data using the check datum, and a transmitting unit (75) transmitting the control data to a programmable control unit (80) of the medical device (25) only if the integrity of the control data is established by the check unit (70). The control unit (80) of the medical device (25) controls the functions of the medical device (20) on the basis of the transmitted control data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 7, 2008
    Date of Patent: June 19, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Thomas Severin, Joern Bungartz
  • Patent number: 8190247
    Abstract: Method for detecting cardiac events, e.g., Atrial Fibrillation (AF) or termination of AF. Based on analysis of the instability observed in heart rate, caused by irregular conduction from the atrium during AF. Change in heart interval is monitored on beat-to-beat basis to recognize instability that indicates presence of AF or Atrial Flutter. A packet of a number of consecutive intervals is evaluated, whether the length of an interval is stable compared with the length of the preceding interval, or whether the length of the subsequent interval has changed. After detection of an instability, instability counter is incremented. The result of the stability test for a packet of intervals is represented by the value of the instability counter. Depending upon whether or not an AF already declared, (indicated by AF status flag), different “X-out-of-Y” criterion are applied. AF status flag set/cleared when declaring AF/termination of AF.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 14, 2009
    Date of Patent: May 29, 2012
    Assignee: Biotronik CRM Patent AG
    Inventors: Indra B. Nigam, Dirk Muessig