The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jul. 17, 2012
Filed:
Mar. 13, 2009
Michael S. Butler, St. Charles, IL (US);
Brian D. Hartsell, Aurora, IL (US);
Michael S. Butler, St. Charles, IL (US);
Brian D. Hartsell, Aurora, IL (US);
Life Spine, Inc., Hoffman Estates, IL (US);
Abstract
A spinal rod connector provides single step locking of a spinal rod relative to a bone screw. The single step lock-up is in line with the vertebral bone screw while still allowing for effectively 360° of rotation of a portion of the spinal rod connector assembly with the spinal rod (but functionally 180° or +/−90° of the 0° position depicted in the various figures). The present spinal rod connector assembly utilizes components having V-shapes of various angles to provide holding of the spinal rod. A pulling and compression force locks the spinal rod onto the spinal rod connector and thus relative to the vertebral bone screw to which the spinal rod connector assembly is attached. The present spinal rod connector allows easy sliding down on guides of the spinal rod connector assembly since spinal rod rotation locks up from the rod being pulled towards the vertebral bone screw.