Ceiling mount

Details Ceiling mount Ceiling mount

2000-06-29

2002-04-02

Ramirez, Ramon O. (Department: 3632)

Supports

Suspended supports

C248S278100, C359S368000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06364268

ABSTRACT:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a ceiling mount for a microscope, in particular a surgical microscope.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Ceiling mounts are used in a very wide variety of applications, and are differently configured depending on the different application requirements.
One major application area is intensive care medicine, in which medical devices, trays, instrument holders, etc. must be maneuverable with as much flexibility as possible in the vicinity of the patient.
The Dräger company has marketed, under product names including “Movita,™” “Ondal,™” “Julian,®” and “Sola,™” a series of ceiling mounts that used in intensive medicine and intensive care.
Ceiling mounts are also known, however, in the field of surgical microscopy, in which they are used principally in cases in which the surgical area is stationary, i.e. the surgical microscope does not leave the room.
In contrast to conventional floor stands, which usually are of a displaceable configuration, ceiling mounts are often fixed in position at one point (the attachment point on the ceiling, usually a ceiling console). The weight of the entire structure, and any tilting torques, are absorbed at that point.
Displaceable floor stands, on the other hand, often have a counterweight that balances out the weight of the microscope and of the support arms holding it by way of a vertical column, so that it does not tip over. In an earlier stand (MS-C™) of the Applicant, see brochure WILD M680 Short overview of functions, printed in 1993, an equipment box with the control system and energy supply system for the microscope was used as part of the counterweight. This box was mounted on the vertical column of the strand, and a mechanism prevented the box and the microscope from projecting in one direction on the same side, could have caused the stand to tip over.
Since modern microscopes require control and energy supply systems placed in a comparable equipment box, when designing a ceiling mount the question arises as to how the equipment box is to be mounted.
A simple solution would be to place the equipment box on the floor in the vicinity of the microscope. This would, inter alia, reduce weight at the ceiling attachment point. On the other hand, however, the absence of the weight of the equipment box or of another counterweight on the ceiling mount would result in an asymmetrical tilting load on the ceiling console, since it then carries only the microscope and its support arms on one side. The effect, known per se, of weight compensation through the vertical (i.e. the column, in the case of floor stands) is absent.
Another mounting possibility would be to suspend the equipment box on the ceiling mount, so that a configuration comparable to a floor stand (MS-C™) would result. The disadvantages would then be, however, that the equipment box would be mounted directly on the vertical or on the vertical support. The equipment box would then be either near the ceiling (with the disadvantage of poor operability) or at operating height (with the disadvantage of interfering in the core area of the operating theater). The advantage of a ceiling mount, namely a large overhead working range and little interference with personnel in the core area of the operating theater, would thereby be limited.
A vibration problem would also result, since if the equipment box were moved, the vibrations thereby produced would necessarily be passed on to the microscope; and conversely, movements of the microscope would cause vibratory excitation of the equipment box that then might be coupled back in.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The object of the invention is therefore, as a first problem, to integrate the microscope and equipment box onto the ceiling mount without exhibiting the disadvantages recited above.
This problem is solved by way of two inventive steps: First, the equipment box has allocated to it a separate horizontal compensating arm on which it—usually projecting from the microscope—is pivotable about a vertical; and second, there is also allocated to the equipment box a separate vertical support which is attached to the ceiling console in addition to the vertical support for the microscope. This support carries the compensating arm.
Although configurations having two or more vertical supports arranged next to one another that were not provided for microscopes are already known from the Dräger ceiling mounts mentioned earlier, the latter were provided for a completely different reason. In such known mounts the vibration problem plays a subordinate role, since it is only when looking through a microscope that a vibration becomes annoying.
The combination of these two steps results in a ceiling mount that offers the least impediment to personnel with the greatest freedom of movement. Leaving this aside, the tilting load on the ceiling mounting point can be minimized if the microscope and equipment box are positioned diametrically opposite one another through the vertical. If the horizontal compensating space is moreover pivotable via a horizontal axis or is telescopically extendable, operability and the freedom of movement of personnel are greatly improved.
On the other hand, however, the separation between the microscope and microscope supports and the equipment box and equipment box supports also results in a reduction in manual vibratory influences, so that the new configuration according to the present invention achieves all the aforesaid objects merely by way of its basic structure.
The above object is achieved by a ceiling mount which comprises a ceiling console, a first vertical support and a microscope, a second vertical support is attached to the ceiling console and is parallel to the first vertical support, an auxiliary mount is carried by the second vertical support, and a counterweight is attached to the auxiliary mount.
Particular embodiments and developments are recited in the dependent claims.
Advantageously, the compensation arm of the equipment box is pivotable in a vertical plane, as is the horizontal support arm of the microscope, and/or a telescopic vertical support arm could also enhance operability.
If necessary, the equipment box itself is also pivotable about a vertical axis on its suspension from the compensation arm, which also increases user-friendliness.
Advantageously, the horizontal support arm of the microscope is furthermore subdivided into at least two portions, so that the horizontal support arm can in itself also be bent about at least one vertical and/or about at least one horizontal, thus resulting in more movement capabilities and positioning capabilities in space for the microscope.
Preferably a control panel and a display—remote from the equipment box—are furthermore mounted on a separate console in the region of the microscope. They can be attached, for example, to the wall of the room or to the horizontal support arm of the microscope.
Another object of the invention, however, is a further critical improvement in vibration behavior, which can also in itself be regarded as independent of the aforementioned objects since it relates also to configurations without an equipment box, and in fact to floor stands and wall stands.
The problem of vibration damping is a general one in stand design. In the “OHS” designed by the Applicant and now also on the market, good damping properties were achieved by a particular configuration of and choice of material for the support and also, in particular, by a particular choice of materials for damping support feet with respect to the floor. In the case of a ceiling mount, however, the vibration behavior is fundamentally different, since the ceiling mount is rigidly attached to a building element. The theories of vibration feedback through insufficiently damping support feet were fundamentally inapplicable here. It was also, of course, impossible to provide damping support feet.
This object is therefore achieved by another inventive step that can also be used advantageously in other ceiling mounts or even in floor stands:
The inventor has recognized tha

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