Omron Healthcare Company Ltd.

Colgate Palmolive Company

Kyowa Hakko Kirin Co., Limited

Hideaki Yoshida

Takashi Torihama

Masashi Kitamura

Yasuhiro Kawabata

Hideyuki Yamashita

Mamoru Katano

Thomas E Mintel

Joseph Edward Fattori

Nobuaki Takahashi

Tatsuya Kobayashi

Shiro Kataoka

Kazuhiro Motoki

Masayuki Kai

Tetsuya Hagiwara

Kosuke Abe

Kotaro Kitajo

Sakae Morikawa

Kenji Fujii

Toshihiko Ogura

Yoshihiko Sano

Shinya Tanaka

Takahide Tanaka

Minoru Taniguchi

Yasunori Hata

Katsunori Kondo

Tadashi Tone

Motofumi Nakanishi

Toshifumi Matsumoto

Kentaro Tomori

A replacement head for detachable coupling to an oral care implement body. The replacement head may include a head having at least one treatment element and a tubular sleeve extending from the head and defining a cavity having an axis that receives a stem of the oral care implement body. The tubular sleeve may have a proximal edge that defines an opening into the cavity. A slot in the tubular sleeve is configured to mate with a boss of the stem of the oral care implement body. The slot may include an entry slot section extending from the proximal edge of the tubular sleeve towards the head and a locking slot section extending from the entry slot section towards the head. The locking slot section may have a first lateral wall that is oblique to the cavity axis and a second lateral wall that is parallel to the cavity axis.

Oral care implement and replacement head thereof

A biological information measurement device that performs sound wave communications with an external terminal including a microphone includes a housing; a measurement circuit that measures biological information; a modulation circuit that converts the biological information measured into a sound wave signal; and a vibration member that vibrates based on the sound wave signal transmitted from the modulation circuit. The measurement circuit, the modulation circuit and the vibration member are provided inside the housing. The housing includes a terminal placement surface on which the terminal is placed. The vibration member and the terminal placement surface are in contact with each other so that vibration of the vibration member is transmitted to the terminal placement surface.

Biological information measurement device

In one embodiment, the invention can be a brush unit detachable from a main body unit of an electric toothbrush. The brush unit includes: a light transmitting part included on a front surface of the brush unit, a plurality of tooth cleaning elements extending from the front surface of the brush unit in a pressing direction, wherein the light transmitting part directs more light in a first direction, which intersects the pressing direction, than in the pressing direction; and a light receiving part included on the front surface for receiving light; wherein the light transmitting part and the light receiving part are arranged on opposing sides of the plurality of tooth cleaning elements; and wherein the first direction lies within a plane including both the light transmitting part and the light receiving part.

Electric toothbrush, brush unit, and method for operating an electric toothbrush

An electric toothbrush that detects plaque on the teeth, ensures accurate plaque detection, and performs cleaning of plaque. The electric toothbrush may include a body having a gripping part and a stem with a brush unit detachably coupled to the body. The electric toothbrush may include a light emitting element for emitting light onto the tooth and a light receiving element for receiving light that reflects off of the tooth. A controller may be included to determine an amount of plaque on the tooth based on the amount of reflected light detected. The electric toothbrush may also include a fluid dispensing system that dispenses fluid based on the amount of reflected light detected. In some aspects, the electric toothbrush may operate in multiple oscillation modes, and it may only dispense fluid in some of the modes but not all of the modes.

Electric toothbrush and method for operating an electric toothbrush

An oral care implement body to which a replacement head can be detachably coupled. In one embodiment, the oral care implement body includes a gripping portion having a shoulder, a stem extending from the shoulder along a longitudinal axis, and a boss protruding from an outer surface of the stem. The boss may have a locking rib section having an undercut surface that is axially spaced from the shoulder and a positioning rib section extending from the locking rib section to the shoulder. The undercut surface may circumferentially protrude from a first side surface of the positioning rib section. The locking rib section may extend along a first rib axis and the positioning rib section may extend along a second rib axis, the first rib axis oriented obliquely to the second rib axis.

Oral care implement body and replacement head therefor

The plaque detecting device of the present invention comprises a light emitting unit () which irradiates ultraviolet or blue excitation light (L) toward the tooth surface (), and a first and second light receiving units () which receive radiated light (L′) from the tooth surface (). The first light receiving unit extracts the spectral component of a first wavelength region including the wavelength range of fluorescent light specific to plaque from the radiated light (L′), and obtains a first output value corresponding to the intensity of that spectral component. The second light receiving unit extracts, from the radiated light (L′), the spectral component of a second wavelength region containing the wavelength range of the fluorescent light specific to enamel and having a predetermined lower limit wavelength below the lower limit wavelength of the first wavelength region, and obtains a second output value corresponding to the intensity of this spectral component. Determination of the relative magnitude of the ratio between the first output value and the second output value as compared to a first threshold value is performed. Determination of the relative magnitude of the difference between the first output value and the second output value as compared to a second threshold value is performed.

Plaque detecting device and toothbrush incorporating same

An electric toothbrush includes a gyro sensor inside a main body. The gyro sensor detects an angular velocity of the main body and the main body includes a head portion, a neck portion, and a grip portion in a longitudinal axis direction. An angle formed by a longitudinal axis of the main body in a state that brush bristles of the head portion contact with a brushing site in a dentition with respect to the longitudinal axis of the main body in a state that the brush bristles of the head portion contact with a reference position in the dentition is obtained, based on an output from the gyro sensor. A corresponding point corresponding to the brushing site on an approximate curve that curves corresponding to the dentition is obtained based on the angle, and coordinates of the corresponding point are used as a translational position of the brushing site.

Electric toothbrush, system, brushing site detection method, and computer-readable recording medium

A toothbrush of the present invention includes: a main body including a head portion having a bristle raising surface on which bristles are provided in a standing manner; a light emission unit configured to emit light through a specific region of the bristle raising surface to a tooth surface; and a light reception unit configured to receive radiated light from the tooth surface resulting from the light through the specific region, the light emission unit and the light reception unit being provided in the main body. The toothbrush also includes a detection unit configured to collectively detect whether or not dental plaque or dental calculus is present on the tooth surface based on an output from the light reception unit. The toothbrush further includes a determination unit configured to determine that dental calculus is present on the tooth surface.

Toothbrush and system

A plaque detecting device including a light emitting unit which irradiates light toward a tooth, and first and second light receiving units which receive radiated light from the tooth. The first light receiving unit extracts the spectral component of a first wavelength region containing fluorescent light specific to plaque and obtains a first output value corresponding to intensity of that spectral component. The second light receiving unit extracts the spectral component of a second wavelength region containing fluorescent light specific to enamel and obtains a second output value corresponding to the intensity of this spectral component. Determination of the relative magnitude of the ratio between the first output value and the second output value as compared to a first threshold value is performed. Determination of the relative magnitude of the difference between the first output value and the second output value as compared to a second threshold value is performed.

A toothbrush includes a main body that includes a head portion with a bristle raising surface on which bristles are provided in a standing manner, a grip portion, and a neck portion. A light emission portion that emits light through a specific region of the bristle raising surface toward a tooth surface and a light reception portion that receives radiated light from the tooth surface resulting from the light, through the specific region, are provided inside of the main body. It is determined whether or not there is dental plaque on the tooth surface based on the output of the light reception portion. A light reception and condensing portion that condenses the radiated light from the tooth surface toward the light reception surface of the light reception portion is arranged in the housing portion forming the specific region.

Toothbrush

A toothbrush including a main body having a shape which is narrow and long in one direction; and a brush member which has a cylindrical shape and which is mounted to an end section in the lengthwise direction of the main body. The brush member includes: a head part which has a raised surface, on which bristles are erected, along the lengthwise direction of the main body to which the brush member is mounted; and a neck part which is mounted by engaging with the periphery of the end section of the main body. In the head part, a back surface on the opposite side of the raised surface is opened, and the neck part is provided with a detachment prevention mechanism that prevents the end of the main body to which the brush member is mounted from detaching.

In one embodiment, the invention can be an electric toothbrush. The electric toothbrush may include a driving module configured to oscillate a brush unit; an acceleration sensor configured to generate an output signal; a signal extraction module configured to extract from the output signal (a) a first signal having a frequency at a first threshold or higher and (b) a second signal having a frequency at a second threshold or lower; a brushing site estimation module configured to estimate a brushing site of the brush unit based on the output signal of the acceleration sensor; and a correction module configured to correct the brushing site estimated by the brushing site estimation module based on an amplitude of the first signal and an amplitude of the second signal.

Electric toothbrush device and method

In one embodiment, the invention can be an electric toothbrush including a trajectory detecting module configured to detect a trajectory of movement of a brush, the trajectory including a plurality of positions; an attitude detecting module configured to detect an attitude of the brush; a site estimating module configured to estimate a brushing site for each of the plurality of positions of the trajectory, each estimated brushing site being based on the trajectory detected by the trajectory detecting module; and a back most tooth detecting module configured to detect a back most tooth based on a change of the attitude detected by the attitude detecting module; wherein the site estimating module is further configured to correct the estimated brushing site for each of the plurality of positions of the trajectory based on the estimated site of the detected back most tooth.

Growing community of inventors

Kyoto, Japan

Hideaki Yoshida