Opinion ID: 579288
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Process Claims

Text: 44 Although mathematical calculations are involved in carrying out the claimed process, Arrhythmia Research argues that the claims are directed to a method of detection of a certain heart condition by a novel method of analyzing a portion of the electrocardiographically measured heart cycle. This is accomplished by procedures conducted by means of electronic equipment programmed to perform mathematical computation. 45 Applying the Freeman-Walter- Abele protocol, we accept for the purposes of this analysis the proposition that a mathematical algorithm is included in the subject matter of the process claims in that some claimed steps are described in the specification by mathematical formulae. See In re Johnson, 589 F.2d 1070, 1078, 200 USPQ 199, 208 (CCPA 1979) (Reference to the specification must be made to determine whether [claimed] terms indirectly recite mathematical calculations, formulae, or equations.) We thus proceed to the second stage of the analysis, to determine whether the claimed process is otherwise statutory; that is, we determine what the claimed steps do, independent of how they are implemented. 46 Simson's process is claimed as a method for analyzing electrocardiograph signals to determine the presence or absence of a predetermined level of high-frequency energy in the late QRS signal. This claim limitation is not ignored in determining whether the subject matter as a whole is statutory, for all of the claim steps are in implementation of this method. The electrocardiograph signals are first transformed from analog form, in which they are obtained, to the corresponding digital signal. These input signals are not abstractions; they are related to the patient's heart function. The anterior portion of the QRS signal is then processed, as the next step, by the procedure known as reverse time order filtration. The digital filter design selected by Dr. Simson for this purpose, known as the Butterworth filter, is one of several known procedures for frequency filtering of digital waveforms. The filtered signal is further analyzed to determine its average magnitude, as described in the specification, by the root mean square technique. Comparison of the resulting output to a predetermined level determines whether late potentials reside in the anterior portion of the QRS segment, thus indicating whether the patient is at high risk for ventricular tachycardia. The resultant output is not an abstract number, but is a signal related to the patient's heart activity. 47 These claimed steps of converting, applying, determining, and comparing are physical process steps that transform one physical, electrical signal into another. The view that there is nothing necessarily physical about 'signals'  is incorrect. In re Taner, 681 F.2d 787, 790, 214 USPQ 678, 681 (CCPA 1982) (holding statutory claims to a method of seismic exploration including the mathematically described steps of summing and simulating from). The Freeman-Walter- Abele standard is met, for the steps of Simson's claimed method comprise an otherwise statutory process whose mathematical procedures are applied to physical process steps. 48 It was undisputed that the individual mathematical procedures that describe these steps are all known in the abstract. The method claims do not wholly preempt these procedures, but limit their application to the defined process steps. In answering the question What did the applicant invent?, Grams, 888 F.2d at 839, 12 USPQ2d at 1827, the Simson method is properly viewed as a method of analyzing electrocardiograph signals in order to determine a specified heart activity. Like the court in Abele, which was faced simply with an improved CAT-scan process, 684 F.2d at 909, 214 USPQ at 688, the Simson invention is properly viewed as an electrocardiograph analysis process. The claims do not encompass subject matter transcending what Dr. Simson invented, as in O'Reilly v. Morse, 56 U.S. (15 How.) at 113 (claims covered any use of electric current to transmit characters at a distance); or in Benson, 409 U.S. at 68, 93 S.Ct. at 255, 175 USPQ at 675 (use of claimed process could vary from the operation of a train to verification of driver's licenses to researching the law books for precedents); or in Grams, 888 F.2d at 840, 12 USPQ2d at 1828 (invention had application to any complex system, whether it be electrical, mechanical, chemical or biological, or combinations thereof.) 49 The Simson claims are analogous to those upheld in Diehr, wherein the Court remarked that the applicants do not seek to patent a mathematical formula.... they seek only to foreclose from others the use of that equation in conjunction with all of the other steps in their claimed process. 450 U.S. at 187, 101 S.Ct. at 1057, 209 USPQ at 8. Simson's claimed method is similarly limited. The process claims comprise statutory subject matter.