Abstract:
An infant apparatus having a base, a vertically movable hood and a plurality of walls that form an infant compartment. The apparatus has lateral side walls and a front end door that can be individually opened. There is an interlocking engagement between the upper periphery of the lateral walls and hood by a plurality of pins on the hood that engage brackets located at the top of the front and rear end walls. A latching arrangement allows all three doors to be opened. The side lateral doors are latched by a movable latch member that enters an opening in brackets affixed to the front and rear end walls. The front end wall can be moved vertically upwardly to disengage its latching arrangement to enable it to pivot downwardly. An alignment mechanism is also provided to insure that the movable latch members correctly align with the openings in the brackets.

Description:
RELATED CASES 
     The present application is based upon Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/170,145, filed Dec. 10, 1999 and Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/182,137, filed Feb. 12, 2000. 
    
    
     BACKGROUND 
     The present invention relates to an infant care apparatus and, more particularly, to an improved means of aligning and providing stability for various components that make up the infant care apparatus, including the access doors and vertically movable hood. 
     In the use of infant incubators, the infant care apparatus normally includes an infant compartment within which the infant is positioned and which provides to that infant, a controlled environment to aid in the wellbeing of the infant. It is common for the walls of such compartment to have doors so that the caregiver can have access to the interior of the incubator to carry out an intervention on the infant or simply to place the infant into the incubator or remove the infant therefrom. Normally, the wall itself is the door as the entire wall or side of the infant compartment can be opened by the user, thus, one or more walls may be, in effect, a door or doors to access the internal area of the infant incubator. 
     It is also common that the doors swing open in an outwardly and downwardly direction so that the doors can swing free to provide full access to the infant. Typical of such doors can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,936,824 of Koch et al. Accordingly the normal doors are hinged at their bottom and have latches at their top or upper side areas that can secure the door in a closed position and which latches also can be readily opened by the user. While the construction of the latching mechanisms of such doors is a relatively straight forward engineering task where there are only side doors and where the ends of the incubator are fixed, it becomes more of a problem when the apparatus has three doors that can be opened, that is, along the two elongated lateral sides as well as at one of the ends. 
     As will be used hereinafter by convention, the sides of the infant apparatus will be referred to as the sides paralleling the body of the infant while the ends will be referred to as the rear end, where the infant&#39;s head is generally positioned and which is also adjacent the monitoring and control functions of the infant care apparatus and the front end where the feet of the infant normally are positioned and which area extends away; in cantilever fashion, from the main frame and structure of the infant care apparatus. An example of such an apparatus is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 0,00,000 of Donnelley et al. 
     In such an apparatus with three doors, that is, at the two lateral sides and at the front end of the apparatus, it is obviously important for each of the side doors and the end front door to be openable individually, or, to be able to open all of the doors at the same time without detracting from the overall integrity of the apparatus so as to maintain strength and rigidity to the overall structure. Thus, a door latching mechanism and structural system is needed that would allow all three of such doors to open individually or all at the same time where the apparatus has doors on three sides of the infant compartment to gain access to the infant. In such case, the door and structure for the overall infant apparatus must be sufficiently solid and not sacrifice the integrity of the apparatus, yet there must be a latching arrangement to allow each door to be opened. 
     The problem is thus compounded further where the infant apparatus has a hood that is vertically movable. Such hood has a lower portion where the overall apparatus is functioning as a normal infant incubator and the hood seals against the upper peripheral edges of the sides and ends of the apparatus to form an infant compartment and an upper position where the hood is displaced upwardly with respect to the sides and ends and thus opens the infant compartment. When in the upper position, the hood may also serve to function as a radiant warmer for the infant apparatus, however, in any event, whatever the function of the vertically movable hood, it is clear that when the hood is displaced upwardly to its upper position, there is a more serious structural and integrity problem facing the designer since the sides and ends lack the support that is normally afforded by having a fixed upper hood component and, additionally, there is the problem of providing some system to interengage the upper peripheral edges of the sides and ends with the hood when the hood is moved to its lower position. 
     Thus, with the use of an overhead vertically movable hood, it is also important to provide a means of aligning that hood with the other components of the infant apparatus, and, in particular, with the side doors and end door to lend structural integrity to the overall apparatus. Due to the tolerances present in the manufacturing of relatively large plastic molded components, such as doors and a hood for use in construction an infant apparatus of the present inventive type, some means is necessary for the hood to interfit with the doors to provide accurate alignment as well as add stability to the overall apparatus to provide that needed integrity. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     Accordingly, the present invention relates to a means of stabilizing and providing an infant apparatus where there are three doors that can be opened, all of which are hinged at their bottom and which swing downwardly and outwardly. The doors are the side doors and the front end door to enable full access to and infant positioned within the apparatus. With the present system, any one of the three doors may be opened by the user and the remaining doors will still be structurally strong and sufficiently rigid. The system allows all three doors to be opened at the same time or any lesser number of doors as desired by the user. The system further provides, and maintains, integrity to the overall infant apparatus with the doors in any variety of positions and also provides an additional structural support for the side doors when the hood is in its lowered position. In the preferred embodiment, the side doors are double walled construction. 
     Thus, in the present invention, a door latching system is shown that allows the use of three doors to be operable on an infant apparatus and each door can be opened and closed individually or collectively and yet, the overall structure of the walls surrounding the infant compartment are structurally sound. In addition, there is an integrity system that affixes a vertically movable hood to the upper peripheral edges of the three doors when the hood is lowered to its closed position wherein the infant compartment is operating as an incubator. 
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
     FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an infant incubator constructed in accordance with the present invention; 
     FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the incubator of FIG. 1 with three doors open; 
     FIG. 3 is an enlarged view of one of the alignment features of the present invention; 
     FIG. 4 is an exploded perspective view of the incubator of the present invention; 
     FIG. 5 is an enlarged perspective view of an end door opening feature; and 
     FIGS. 6A and 6B are perspective views of an alignment feature for the side doors of the present invention, FIG. 6C is an enlarged side view of the same feature and FIG. 6D is a cross-sectional view taken along the lines D—D of FIG.  6 C. 
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
     Referring now to FIG. 1, there is shown a perspective view of the incubator  10  constructed in accordance with the present invention and which includes side doors  12  and a front end door  14 . There is also an rear end wall  16  that is preferably fixed in position to the apparatus and ail of the doors  12 ,  14 , and the rear end wall  16 , in use, surround an planar surface on which the infant is positioned. A hood  18  overlies the doors  12 ,  14  and rear end wall  16  and is vertically movable so as to be raised and lowered with respect to the upper peripheral edges of the doors  12 ,  14  and the rear end wall  16 . 
     Thus, when the hood  18  is in its lower position it seals again those upper edges of the doors  12 ,  14  and the rear end wall  16  to form the infant compartment to contain the infant in a protective environment. A typical infant incubator is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,936,824 of Koch et al and an infant apparatus having vertically movable hood is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,453,077 of Donnelly et al. 
     As is conventional, the side doors  12  and  14  may have handholes  20  with handhole doors  22  to cover the handholes  20  when not being used by the attending personnel. As also can be seen, hinges  24  are provided to pivotally affix the side doors  12  to the base of an incubator in conventional manner. The hinge for the end door  14  is a different hinge, not shown in FIG. 1, and will be later explained. 
     Upper end wall brackets  26  are affixed to the upper periphery of the rear end wall  16  and each has a opening  28  that receives a movable latch member  30  from the latches  32 . Basically, the latches  32  will be explained in more detail, however, from FIG. 1 it can be seen the latches have a movable latch member  30  that is spring biased upwardly. Thus the user can release the latch  32  by pressing downwardly on the movable latch member  30  to withdraw the movable latch member  30  from the opening  28  to open the latch  32  and thus be able to open the side doors  12 . Basically the same type of latch  32  is located at each upper corner of the side doors  12 . A further hole  34  is formed in the upper end brackets  26  to provide an alignment with the hood  18  when the hood  18  is in its lowered position and such alignment will also be later explained. 
     In a similar manner, upper front door brackets  36  are affixed to the upper edge of the front end door  14  and also have the same openings  28  to receive the movable latch members  30  of the latches  32  and a hole  34  is also located in the upper front door brackets  36  for alignment with the hood  18 . As can now be seen, however, by a simple manipulation of the latches  32 , both of the side doors  12  can be pivoted about their hinges  24  to open and close those side doors  12 . As can also be seen, there are pins  38  affixed to the hood  18  and depend downwardly therefrom and which enter the holes  34  in the upper end wall bracket  26  and the upper front door bracket  36  to align the hood  18  when moved to its lower position as explained. 
     In the preferred embodiment, the side doors  12  are double walled doors and each have an inner wall  42  and an outer wall  44  so that heated air can pass between the inner and outer walls  42 ,  44  to provide warmth to an infant located within the apparatus. Thus, there are tabs  46  that depend downwardly from the lower edge of the hood  18  and which enter into the passageway  48  formed between inner and outer walls  42 ,  44  to brace the side doors  12  when the hood  18  is in its lowered position. The tabs  46 , in the preferred embodiment, enter the passageway  48  and thus brace the outer wall  44  so that such outer wall  44  can resist being pushed inwardly by persons or objects and therefore will maintain a good seal against the lower edge of the hood  18  and the upper edge of the side doors  12  even when inadvertently pushed inwardly. In the event the apparatus has only a single walled door, however, it is clear that the use of tabs  46  can still be used with a single walled door to brace the upper edge of the door when the hood is lowered. 
     Turning now to FIG. 2, there is shown the incubator  10  as described with respect to FIG. 1 with the side doors  12  and the front end door  14  in the open position. In the FIG., therefore, the side doors  12  have been pivoted in the direction of the arrows A so as to open outwardly and downwardly and the end door  14  also pivoted in the direction of the arrow B to the same open position. Thus, in FIG. 2, there is full access to an infant contained within the apparatus and the hood  18  is in its raised position. As such, therefore, the rear end wall  16  remains fixed in position, as shown, and all of the other walls of the generally rectangular configuration, comprise doors that can be opened for access to the infant positioned within the infant compartment. As also can be seen, that access is virtually unlimited with the hood  18  as show that has been vertically displaced upwardly for that access to the infant, however, all of the doors, that is, the side door  12  and the front end door  14  are all openable with the hood  18  also in its lower position. 
     Turning now to FIG. 3 there is shown an enlarged perspective view of one of the side doors  12  having a latch  32  in accordance with the present invention. As can be seen, the moveable latch member  30  can be depressed downwardly by the user against a spring bias to withdraw that movable latch member  30  from its position projecting into the opening  28  so that the side door  12  can be opened, it being obvious that the same maneuver must be carried out on latch on the other end of the side door so that both latches are opened at the same time. Accordingly, by a simple movement of the movable latch member  30 , the side doors  12  can be opened and closed by the user. As also shown in FIG. 3, the pin  38  of hood  18  aligns with the hole  34  to align the hood  18  and the side doors  12  and end wall  16  of the apparatus as the hood  18  moves to its lower position and also to provide additional rigidity to the overall structure. 
     In the preferred embodiment, in view of the tolerances required in the construction of the overall incubator  10 , two diagonally opposite holes  34  of the incubator  10  are elongated, as shown in FIG. 1, and the other two diagonally opposite holes may be circular. The use of the elongated holes allows the tolerances in the incubator to be reasonable for manufacture and still allow the use of the pins  38  to fit into the holes  34  for alignment and overall integrity of the incubator  10 . 
     Turning next to FIG. 4, there is shown an exploded perspective view of the incubator  10  constructed in accordance with the present invention. In the FIG., there is shown the base  50  of the incubator and which generally contains the convective heating system to provide the heated air through the passageway  48  formed between the inner and outer walls  42 ,  44 . An infant mattress  52  can be positioned atop of the base  50  for the comfort of the infant when contained within the incubator  10 . In the FIG., the affixation of the side doors  12  to the base  50  is also seen and one means is by use of a rod  54  that passes through bores  56  formed in the base  50  as well as in the hinges  24  to pivotally affix the side door  12  to the base  50 . Both side doors are similarly hinged to the base  50 . 
     The front end door  14 , however is hingedly affixed to the base  50  by a differing means and it is noted in FIG. 4 that there are front end door hinges  58  that join the front end door  14  to the base  50 . The front end door hinges  58 , as will become clear, provide a pivotal mounting of the front end door  14  to the base  50  but additionally allow the front end door  14  to be lifted vertically without becoming detached from the base  50 . Thus, the front end door  14  can be both lifted vertically and still pivoted with respect to the base  50  to carry out the opening and closing of the front end door  14 . 
     As a further feature seen in FIG. 4, to be later explained, there are vertically oriented flat projections  60  that extend outwardly from the latches  32  and act to align the movable latch members  30  to the openings  28  to make sure the alignment is correct to allow the latching and unlatching of the side doors  12  with respect to the upper front door brackets  36  and the upper end wall brackets  26 . 
     In FIG. 5, there is shown the means of affixing the front end door  14  to the base  50  of the incubator  10 . As described, the front end door hinges  58  (FIG. 4) allow the front end door  14  to move vertically as well as pivot. As part of that arrangement, the front end door  14  has outwardly extending guides  62  that extend from both sides of the front end door  14  and which are fitted into and ride within slots  64 , only one of which is shown in FIG.  5 . Thus, to open the front end door  14 , the front end door  14  is lifted upwardly such that the outwardly extending guides  62  reach the curve  66  in the slots  64  and then the front end door  14  can be moved to the open position where it is pivoted outwardly and downwardly. 
     By the use of a vertical movement, the front end door  14  can be opened even when the side doors  12  are still closed since the vertical movement allows the openings  28  (FIG. 2) formed in the upper front door brackets  36  to be raised with respect to the movable latch members  30  of the latches  32 . By moving the front end door  14  upwardly, therefore, the movable latch members  30  are withdrawn from the openings  28  to allow the end door  14  to swing free of the latches  32  to open. As can be conventional, there may be, of course, another set of lower outwardly extending guides that extend from the sides of the front end door  14  that ride with a vertical slot formed in the base  50 , not shown, and which guides can be captured in that vertical slot so that the front end door  14  can be opened and still be firmly affixed to the base  50 . 
     Accordingly the side doors  12  can be opened at will individually or both at the same time by using the latches  32  to move the movable latch members  30  downwardly to withdraw from the openings  28  and free the side doors  12 . The same mechanism allows the front end door  14  to be raised vertically to create the same effect, that is, now the openings  28  move upwardly to cause the withdrawal of the movable latch members  30  from the openings  28 . 
     Turning finally to FIGS. 6A,  6 B,  6 C and  6 D, there is shown a cutaway enlarged perspective views of an alignment means for the corners of the side doors  12 , an enlarged side view of the means and a cross sectional view of a component of the means taken along the line D—D of FIG.  6 C. In FIGS. 6A-D, the projections  60  extend outwardly from the latches (FIG. 4) and those projections  60  are blade-like shaped with a vertically orientated flattened plane. As a part of the upper end brackets  26  and the upper door brackets  36  there is a housing  68  depending downwardly having a wedge shaped recesses  70  that receives the projections  60  and guides those projections into the wedge shaped recesses  70  to draw the end door  14  and the end wall  16  into the proper alignment with the latches  32  to insure that the movable latch members will line up with the openings  28 . 
     Thus, as the side doors  12  are closed to be retrained by the latches  32 , the alignment is assured between the movable latch members  30  to properly enter the openings  28  through the use of the projections  60  that enter the wedge shaped recesses  70  to bring about that alignment as the projections  60  move further into the wedge shaped recesses  70 . 
     Those skilled in the art will readily recognize numerous adaptations and modifications which can be made to the infant care apparatus of the present invention which will result in improved features, yet all of which will fall within the scope and spirit of the present invention as defined in the following claims. Accordingly, the invention is to be limited only by the following claims and their equivalents.