R. David Fessler, MD, PhD
Dr. Fessler is a neurosurgery resident at Rush University Medical Center. His interests include minimally invasive spine surgery, spinal cord injury, innovation and invention.
The following is based on the authors’ experience and observation over time and should not be relied upon as legal advice.
In today’s academic environment, inventors are forced to relinquish ownership of their inventions before even conceiving them. Most universities today claim outright ownership of any patentable invention created by any member of the university community. Frequently, this ownership extends...
Any surgeon with a creative mind can come up with an idea for a new surgical innovation, but few are able to make their idea a reality and bring it to market. Here we will briefly address five common questions of novice inventors and, hopefully, will shed some light on the complexities of inventing in neurosurgery.
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