Two Federal Circuit decisions three months apart reached opposite results on method-of-treatment claims. In Teva v. Eli Lilly (April 2026), the court reversed a JMOL of invalidity: because the claims covered only the use of humanized anti-CGRP antagonist antibodies to treat headache — not the antibodies themselves — and the specification taught that all such antibodies work for that purpose, the "research assignment" had been completed. In Wyeth v. AstraZeneca (July 2026), a $107.5 million verdict fell because the claims required daily administration of a "unit dosage" to a human patient, and the specification offered only in vitro data and 250-fold dosage ranges — some of which trial evidence showed were toxic.

The lesson: enablement scrutiny concentrates on whichever limitation carries the invention's genuine technical uncertainty. A well-established genus recited in a method claim does not need exhaustive re-proof. A dosing limitation that determines whether a patient is safely treated does — and a specification that is silent, or actively misleading, on that point will not survive a post-trial motion however favorable the jury verdict.

Attorneys Rivka Monheit and Brian Giles recently co-authored a discussion of these two cases along with attorney Alex Frebowitz, published by the ABA IP Law Section.