Pacific Contact Laboratories, Inc. v. Solex Laboratories, Inc.

Solex Laboratories, Inc.,- as the as-signee of- Kevin M. Tuohy, was issued Patent No. 2,510,438 on June 6, 1950. The patent claims a contact vision corrective lens which fits on the cornea of the eye.

Contact lenses are admittedly old in the art of vision correction. However, the contact lenses in general use prior to the Tuohy patent were shaped to the identical curvature of the fitted eye and were held in.place by the use of scleral flanges that extended over the white of the eye and under the eyelids. Their design cut off the flow of natural fluids, blood and oxygen to the eye. Therefore, the use of contact lenses required the insertion of a buffer solution between the eye and the lens. The buffer solution had to be specially prepared for each person and, even with its use, the lenses could be worn for an average of only four hours.

Tuohy’s claim of invention lay in the development of a contact lens which eliminated the need for buffer solutions and which coüld be worn for long periods without causing eye irritation. Tuohy accomplished this result by eliminating the scleral flanges and making a lens slightly smaller than the limbus portion of the eye, but larger than the…