Surgical Instrument Cards

A surgical instrument is a tool that is specifically designed to facilitate the performance of surgical operations.  Thousands of surgical instruments exist and vary greatly depending on the type of surgical specialty.  Some of the branches of surgery and medicine that utilize specialty surgical instruments are general surgery, orthopedics, genito-urinary procedures, obstetrics, gynecology, endoscopy, neurosurgery, cardiovascular, and oral-maxillofacial surgery.  As a surgical technologist, you are expected to know the name, classification, and use of each surgical instrument both on your sterile field and within your operating room department.  A solid working knowledge of instrumentation is critical to the success of each surgical technologist.  As a first step in building this knowledge, you will put together a set of surgical instrument flashcards that will help you learn and memorize 100 of the most commonly used instruments.  Once completed, you may find it useful to keep this project and add to it throughout your practice.