Patent ID: 8744580

Claim:
An implantable medical device adapted to be acoustically coupled to a second medical device, the implantable medical device comprising: a hermetically sealed implantable device housing having a housing wall with an interior surface; an ultrasonic transducer disposed within the implantable device housing and configured to acoustically couple to the second medical device, the ultrasonic transducer comprising a piezoelectric disc configured to transmit an outgoing acoustic signal to the second medical device and receive an incoming acoustic signal from the second medical device; a metallic membrane interposed between the interior surface of the housing wall and the piezoelectric disc, the membrane configured to couple a center portion of the piezoelectric disc to the interior surface of the housing wall, the metallic membrane including an annular ring portion radially surrounding the piezoelectric disc; and wherein the ultrasonic transducer is configured to operate at a resonance frequency at or above 20 KHz.