It may seem fairly obvious but hospital theatres use specific surgical instruments sets depending on what procedure they are carrying out.
For instance, if they are carrying out a Rhinoplasty, they will use a Rhinoplasty set. If they are carrying out a Caesarean Section, there will be a Caesarean Section set available.
These sets are very important, as they ensure and determine that the surgeons have effectively the correct tools for the job. when carrying out an i.e. Rhinoplasty the surgeon will want to ensure they have the correct nasal scissors, or maybe a particular angled swivel knife.
Where there are specific tools for each job, there is also an underlying common element to each of the instrument sets. On each tray, you will generally see a Rampley Sponge holders, Scalpel Handles, Syringe Cartridges, Gillies Dissecting forceps, Halstead mosquito forceps, tissue scissors such as Metzenbaum and dressing scissors, such as Mayo and tissue forceps such as Allis Tissue forceps. A very common artery forcep is a Spencer Wells, which has been in existence for over 100 years!
Generally, when the instruments are washed and sterilised, the Sterile services staff will use din baskets, which are stainless steel wire baskets, which hold the instruments whilst they are reprocessed for use.
There can be as many as 100+ instruments on a tray, so Mayo Instrument pins may be used for organising instruments.
With the various instruments, there may be different features on them, such as a hard Tungsten Carbide Edge on a scissor for hardness and durability. Tungsten carbide inserts are also used on needle holders for the same reason. This feature is generally indicated by gold bows on the instrument.
We have put together some example surgical instruments’ tray lists here which may be of interest, but for more information please drop us an email. You can also visit our instrument refurbishment page here.