Patent Application
20230301443
Not applicable.
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The field of the present inventive concept relates generally to a method, systems, and equipment utilized to protect and stabilize the neck and head of a newborn baby, an infant, or a child while the child is enclosed in a child safety seat within a moving vehicle. For this disclosure, the term “Child safety seat” includes an infant safety seat, child seat, baby seat, and car seat. This inventive concept is designed as a method using specific components to assist in preventing unnecessary movement of a child's head while the child is strapped in a child safety seat within a motor vehicle or an aircraft.
In this document, the term “infant,” for the purposes of this disclosure, is defined as a very young child or baby. The meaning of “child” is defined as “a young person especially between infancy and puberty” www.merriam-websier.com. Specifically, the children for whom this inventive concept is intended may hypothetically be in the range from infancy to 8 years of age. The terms “infant” and “toddler” are used to generally distinguish the relative size and age at various stages of child development.
Seat belts are designed to fit adults. Specifically, seat belts are designed to support the body in a crash by distributing the energy of a crash's impact so it does not hit the passengers' body all at once. Even at low speeds, crash forces in an accident can approach more than 30 G's (where one “G” is equivalent to the gravitational pull of the Earth). By comparison, fighter pilots are able to sustain up to 9 G's for brief periods of time, with the assistance of specially-designed “G-suits,” which prevents blood from pooling in their legs and abdominal area during flight maneuvers. Automotive seat belts grip the body by its strongest points—the hips, shoulders, and rib cage.
Unfortunately, normal seat belt designs do not accommodate the much smaller size of infants and toddlers. Because of this design factor (or flaw), the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recommends children be in booster seats or car child safety seats until the age of 12. This is further modified, under circumstances when the child reaches at least 4-feet-9-inches tall, which is the height at which a person can safety use a seat belt.
Even with the recommendations of car seats or booster seats for smaller framed individuals, there is an area of the body of an infant or child that is not completely protected in the event of a crash, or even during normal, routine operations of a vehicle. Children often fall asleep during car rides. During their periods of sleep while traveling, the chest restraints do not prevent the head from ‘bobbing’ during the vehicle's motion. Typical travel pillows have been used to stabilize the larger individual's head movement but have not been proven reliably stable during vehicle crashes. The author has observed, during extended automobile trips, that an infant needs a more stable and reliable means to immobilize the infant's or child's head, yet providing comfort during travel.
The primary reason for this inventive concept is to provide parents with a travel kit 2 (the kit 2 being essentially packaging or boxing) that can be deployed by attaching fasteners and a travel support pillow to a child safety seat. In this manner, an additional level of protection is given to a child, toddler, or infant's neck, spine, and head area in the event of any unforeseen incident or accident, while traveling in a motor vehicle.
Another objective is to provide comfort to a child in sleep, protecting his/her head from sudden side-to-side rolling motion during normal motor vehicle traveling.
An additional purpose of this invention is to provide parents with peace of mind While traveling with their children or infants and/or toddlers for which they are responsible for transporting. A commonly used phrase in this document is the term, “child,” which refers to youth from newborn to pre-teen children.
U.S. Patent Application No. 2019/0008280 A1; Buch; Jan. 10, 2019. Neck Pillow, a Prior Art, is a U-shaped Soft Surface, provides head support and thus helps napping. Anchored Pilo improves the quality of the bead support provided by Neck Pillow. Anchored Pilo expands the use of Neck Pillow (and other Soft Surfaces) by anchoring it. An adjustable length Strap is used for anchoring. The Length adjustability makes Anchored Pilo usable for chairs and people of different dimensions. A Neck Pillow with Strap can still be used as Neck Pillow when the Strap is not used for anchoring.
U.S. Patent Application No. 2012/0217786 A1; Kim; Aug. 30, 2012. A support device for a vehicle child seat belt tightens the shoulders and the abdominal area of a child using the existing vehicle seat belt as it is in a state where the vest type support device is easily worn on the body of the child, and which includes a cushion body for fastening the entire front face of the body of the child and an auxiliary belt for preventing the child from upwardly or downwardly escaping from the seat belt. The vehicle child seat belt support device includes: a shock-preventing cushion body formed to surround a child's body and having a seat belt receiving part formed on a front face thereof in such a fashion that the seat belt is detachably accommodated in the seat belt receiving part.
U.S. Patent Application No. 2005/02641055; Lincoln, M.; Dec. 1, 2005. A children's pillow adapted for use with a children's car seat comprising: (a) a central area adapted to receive at least a rearward portion of a child's head; (b) a first lateral wing extending from the central area; (c) a second lateral wing extending from the central area; (d) a neck support region; and (e) a retainer adapted to mount the children's pillow to the children's car seat, where the neck support region extends between the first lateral wing and the second lateral wing.
U.S. Patent Application; 2005/0015881 A1; Littlehorn, S. Jan. 27, 2005. A neck pillow system comprises a neck pillow comprising a pillow body having a medial region and two arms that each have an end. The arms extend from the medial region to form a generally open well, and the neck pillow is configured to be placed around a baby's neck, with the medial region being positioned at the baby's back and the two ends positioned at the baby's front. A bib is removably coupled to the pillow body near each of the ends to permit the bib to hang vertically down over the baby's chest.
U.S. Patent No. 2007/0052274 A1; Morphew et al; Mar. 8, 2007. A car seat pillow is in the form of an elongated, generally cylindrically shaped pillow casing filled with pillow stuffing. Each end face of the pillow is provided with an attaching element to adjustably attach the pillow to the support frame of a car seat. Each attaching element may include a flexible strap for releasable engagement with a corresponding shoulder strap guide formed on the sides of a car seat.
U.S. Patent No. 2021/27839 A1; Recchia, D.; May 6, 2021. The invention relates to a travel pillow (10) which is designed as an essentially U-shaped neck pillow and has a first leg (12) and a second leg (14), which are connected by a central part (16), the first leg (12) terminating in a first leg tip (22) and the second leg (14) terminating in a second leg tip (24), and the travel pillow (10) having a circumferential inner side and a circumferential outer side and a top side (18), a bottom side (20) and a central plane (M), characterized in that the travel pillow (10) has a reinforcing strip (30) which extends from the first leg (12) through the central part (16) to the second leg (14).
U.S. Patent Application No. 2015/0216335 A1; Schwingendorf et al; Aug. 6, 2015. The embodiments disclosed are related to a supportive head and neck pillow with a supportive bone structure inside the pillow. The pillow is used for head and neck support, and comfort while sleeping sitting up during transportation. It can also be used for head and neck support for people who have neck injuries, or to prevent neck injuries during transportation. The sleepy heads neck pillow disclosed comprises a pillow with a bone structure support inside it.
The disclosed inventive concept comprises a kit having at least one variably-sized travel pillow, each pillow fabricated with a sewn-in loop fastener 12(a) and a sewn-in combination fastener 16(a). Further, a fixed hook fastener 12 and a fixed combination fastener 16 are provided. The sewn-in loop fastener 12(a) and sewn-in combination fastener 16(a) are located on the inner side of the travel pillows so as to enable the convenient attachment to correspondingly-mated fixed hook fasteners and fixed combination fasteners. The fixed hook fastener and the fixed combination fastener are designed to be affixed to the left and right frontal vertical surfaces of a child safety seat. The components of the inventive concept are provided in the form of a travel kit 2.
The first level of motor vehicle safety for children is provided by the vehicle's installed seat belt. Because of a child's smaller size, a second level of safety, being an infant's or child's safety seat 8, 9 must be utilized in order to ensure the security and safety of any small person, during transportation. Prior Art infant's safety seat 8, and child's safety seat 9, shown in
The present inventive concept overcomes the shortcomings of the standard infant car seat by providing an additional safety feature to an area of the body, specifically, proximate the head and neck area of an infant, that has been difficult to protect, even with the use of an infant's car seat or toddler's booster seat.
The objects, features, and advantages of the inventive concept presented in this application are more readily understood when referring to the accompanying drawings. The drawings, totaling twenty-two figures, show the basic components and functions of embodiments of the described methods of use. In the several figures, like reference numbers are used in each figure to correspond to the same component as may be depicted in other figures.
The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the inventive concept. As used herein, the term “and/or” includes any and all combinations of one or more of the associated listed items. As used herein, the singular forms “a,” “an,” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well as the singular forms, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. It will be further understood that the terms “comprises” and/or “comprising,” when used in this specification, specify the presence of stated features, steps, operations, elements, and/or components, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, steps, operations, elements, components, and/or groups thereof.
The discussion of the present inventive concept will be initiated with
The first level, of motor vehicle safety for infants 10 and toddlers 10(a) is via the vehicle's installed seat belt 50. Because of infants' 10 and toddlers' 10(a) smaller size, a second level of safety should be applied in order to ensure the security and safety of any child, infant, or toddler, during transportation. Prior art devices 8 and 9 are used to indicate this second level of safety and security within a motor vehicle. Added to these car safety seats 8, 9 is the supplemental support of the vehicle's installed seat belt 50.
As an effective safety improvement to the infant ear safety seat 8 and the toddler's car safety seat 9, the following disclosure depicts embodiments of an anti-roll travel support pillow, referred to herein as a “travel support pillow 1,” which is included within a packaged kit 2. The travel support pillow 1 included in the kit 2 is distinguished by having diametrically-opposed, equally-shaped, complimentary left and right extension components. Due to the differences in weight, size, and height within the age range of infants to toddlers, there is a requirement for variation in the structure and dimensions of the embodiments of the travel support pillow 1.
The general purpose of the embodiments of the travel support pillow 1 is to prevent injury that may be caused by sudden jerks and oscillations of an infant's or toddler's head and neck area should he or she fall asleep while strapped in either car safety seat 8, 9. With this purpose in mind, a first embodiment of the travel support pillow I is entitled an “oval-contoured travel pillow” 20, while the second embodiment of the travel support pillow is entitled a “dish-shaped travel pillow” 30. When reference is made herein to a travel support pillow 1 in general, this terminology includes both the oval-contoured travel pillow 20 and the dish-shaped travel pillow 30.
In order to provide efficient and variable functional use of the inventive concept discussed herein, consumers will be provided a kit 2 comprising three components: (a) at least one travel support pillow 1, 20, 30, (b) a stand-alone fixed hook fastener 12; and (c) a stand-alone fixed combination fastener 16. It is to be noted that within the kit 2, (not shown) the travel support pillow 1, 20, 30 will have an integral sewn-in loop fastener 12(a) stitched onto the inner surface of the left extension component of the travel support pillow 1, and a sewn-in combination fastener 16(a) stitched onto the inner surface of the right extension component of the travel support pillow 1, 20, 30.
As further discussed herein, the consumer/user, upon accessing the kit 2 packaging, must proceed to attach the fixed hook fastener 12 and the fixed combination fastener 16 to the frontal vertical surface of either an infant seat 8 or a toddler's safety seat 9. Once the steps of attaching the fixed hook fastener 12 and the fixed combination fastener 16 to the infant's or toddler's safety seat 8, 9 is completed, a user is then able to place a child into the car safety seat 8 or 9. Thereupon, at the user's discretion, the user grasps the travel support pillow 1, and first initiates fastening of the combination fastener 16(a) to the fixed combination fastener 16. In the preferred embodiment, the stand-alone fixed hook fastener 12 and fixed combination fastener 16 are integral to a binding strip 13 to which an adhesive substance 7 may be affixed.
While avoiding placing pressure on the chin area of the infant 10 or toddler 10(a), the user next fastens the sewn-in loop fastener 12(a) onto the fixed hook fastener 12, which has previously been attached to the left frontal vertical surface of the car safety seat 8, 9. When the travel support pillow 1 is placed in position by a user, a slight amount of finger pressure must be applied to place the sewn-in combination fastener 16(a) firmly against both a male snap 3 and the hook component 6 of the fixed hook fastener 12, as can be more readily understood by viewing
The user, when unseating the infant 10 or toddler 10(a), may for the sake of convenience, detach only the sewn-in loop fastener 12(a) from its connection to the fixed hook fastener 12 and have the sewn-in combination fastener 16(a) remain connected to the fixed combination fastener 16. The travel support pillow 1 then remains in the vehicle, readily available for its next use.
To account for the wide variance in size and weight of a newborn versus an infant or a toddler, the travel support pillow 1, as stated earlier exists in two embodiments: the oval-contoured travel pillow 20, and the dish-shaped travel pillow 30. In viewing
Specifically shown in
The oval-contoured travel pillow 20 of
When the oval-contoured travel pillow 20 is placed in use, the sewn-in loop fastener 12(a) will be detachably connected to a fixed hook fastener 12, which fixed hook fastener 12 has previously been attached (in the preferred embodiment, adhesively) to either an infant's child seat 8 or a toddler's safety seat 9. The location and orientation of the fixed hook fastener 12 is more clearly displayed in
Turning to
Upon a user removing the protective covering 14, the resultant mechanism is the fixed combination fastener 16, shown in the center illustration of
The rightmost illustration of
In viewing
Upon a user separating the protective covering 14, from the fixed hook fastener 12, the fixed hook fastener 12 is then readied for adhesively attaching (by means of the adhesive) to the exterior front hard surface of either an infant safety seat 8 or a toddler safety seat 9. Examples of the positioning of the fixed hook fastener 12 on a safety seat are more readily visualized in both
It is important to note that both the fixed combination fastener 16 and the fixed hook fastener 12 are two separate, stand-alone items contained in a user's kit 2, both of which must be removed from the kit 2 (not shown) and placed upon the right frontal vertical surface and the left frontal vertical surface, respectively, of an infant safety seat 9 or a toddler safety seat 9.
The rightmost illustration of
A curvilinear basin 31 is also shown, the basin 31 being the area proximate a toddler's chin and neck when the dish-shaped travel pillow 30 is placed in service. Out of view, at the curved tip of the right shoulder inner surface 34(b), is attached a sewn-in combination fastener 16(a). Also out of view, at the curved tip of the left shoulder inner surface 35(b), is attached a sewn-in loop fastener 12(a).
The sewn-in combination fastener 16(a) is a unique combination of the loop component 5 of a hook-and-loop fastening mechanism, along with a female snap 4. The sewn-in combination fastener 16(a) is more readily understood by viewing
In the preferred method of operation, a user, as the last step in the use of the dish-shaped travel pillow 30, will place the sewn-in loop fastener 12(a) in attachment to fixed hook fastener 12, which fixed hook fastener 12 has been previously adhesively attached to either an infant's child seat 8 or a toddler's safety seat 9. The location and orientation of the fixed hook fastener 12 is more clearly displayed in
When accessing either embodiment of the travel support pillow 1 from its packaging as a kit 2, a user must first remove the upholstered covering (if any) from the upper section of either an infant safety seat 8 or a toddler's safety seat 9. Thereupon, the user separates the protective covering 14 from the adhesive 7 backing of a fixed combination fastener 16. The fixed combination fastener 16 is then placed on the right frontal vertical surface of the infant safety seat 8 or the toddler's safety seat 9.
The user next separates the protective covering 14 from the adhesive 7 backing of a fixed hook fastener 12. The fixed hook fastener 12 is then also placed on the left frontal vertical surface of the infant safety seat 8 or the toddler's safety seat 9. The user must follow the written instructions for use of the adhesive 7 as indicated in the kit 2. The kit 2 (not shown) is essentially packaging containing the working components of the inventive concept. The placement of the fixed combination fastener 16 and fixed hook fastener 12 are illustrated in
In some circumstances a user must remove and afterwards, replace the seat cushion covering of certain car models. The oval-contoured travel pillow 20 supports the infant's 10 head when the oval-contoured pillow 20 is mounted underneath the chin, behind the ears, and proximate the neck area, as indicated in
When not needed, the oval-contoured travel pillow 20 or the dish-shaped travel pillow 30 may be pulled apart to release support from a child or toddler's neck area by unsnapping the sewn-in combination fastener 16(a) from its connection to the female snap 7 of the fixed combination fastener 16. To re-connect, it is only necessary to press these two connecting mechanisms together again. The design of the travel support pillows 20, 30 also makes it easy for a toddler to unhook the connection When he or she awakens, without the assistance of another person.
While preferred embodiments of the present inventive method have been shown and disclosed herein, it Will be obvious to those persons skilled in the art that such embodiments are presented by way of example only, and not as a limitation to the scope of the inventive concept. Numerous variations, changes, and substitutions may occur or be suggested to those skilled in the art without departing from the intent, scope, and totality of this inventive concept. Such variations, changes, and substitutions may involve other features which are already known per se and which may be used instead of, in combination with, or in addition to features already disclosed herein. Accordingly, it is intended that this inventive concept be inclusive of such variations, changes, and substitutions, as described by the scope of the claims presented herein.
This application claims the benefit of priority from previously-filed U.S. provisional patent application, Ser. No. 63/372,665, filed on Mar. 25, 2022. This application also claims the benefit of priority from previously-filed provisional patent application, Ser. No. 63/372,666, filed on Mar. 25, 2022 and further, claims the benefit of the content of both said provisional patent applications as though fully appearing herein.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 63372665 | Mar 2022 | US | |
| 63372666 | Mar 2022 | US |
