Patent Law FAQ

The MPEP 2106.04(d)(2) provides examples of claims that do not integrate a judicial exception through treatment. These include:

• Insignificant extra-solution activity: “For example, a claim reciting the step of ‘administering a drug providing 6-thioguanine to a patient’ (without more) is not a meaningful limitation.”
• General treatment: “For example, consider a claim that recites mentally analyzing information to identify if a patient has a genotype associated with poor metabolism of beta blocker medications and then ‘administering a lower than normal dosage of a beta blocker medication to a patient identified as having the poor metabolizer genotype.’”
• Field of use limitations: “For instance, a claim that recites ‘administering a suitable medication to a patient’ is not a meaningful limitation because it does not specify what the medication is or how it is administered.”

These examples illustrate that treatments that are too general, lack specificity, or are merely incidental to the core of the invention may not be sufficient to integrate a judicial exception into a practical application.

To learn more:

• judicial exception
• treatment claims
• patent eligibility
• insignificant extra-solution activity