Single-use Instruments Operate at Peak Performance

Why these tools are gaining traction in orthopedics.

Prepackaged single-use instruments have been around for a while, but demand for these tools among providers is surging, which makes sense. These sterile instruments can help streamline workflow, reduce risk of infection and lower costs associated with cleaning and reprocessing.

They give surgeons something that is cutting-edge right out of the packaging: Instruments that are immediately operating at the peak performance of their manufactured life.

I’ve seen firsthand how much better workflow can become because of single-use instruments. To me, this seems like the natural evolution of surgical instrumentation for facilities.

A smaller footprint

As a board-certified orthopedic spine surgeon, I tend to use more single-use instruments. That’s true in the general orthopedic space as well.

Single-use often allows for a smaller footprint on institutions. There’s a domino effect from the advantages that benefit providers and patients alike. Speedy turnovers allow more procedures to be completed daily, boosting revenue and patient satisfaction.

Take a lumbar fusion surgery, for instance. This procedure may normally require six to eight trays of instruments that must be processed and brought into the OR. If we can prepare just two or three single-use instrument trays for sterilization and then add the implant needed for that patient based on preoperative planning, we decrease the footprint on the sterilization and cleaning process — before and after surgery. That efficiency, in turn, improves the entire experience for the patient and for the institution.

Single-use instruments can even provide patients more options for where they can go for surgery because they can play a major role in providers’ ability to perform procedures in outpatient settings.

Prepackaged sterile instruments align well with same-day ASCs’ efficiency aims by reducing the number of items that need to be processed. Plus, in a world where postoperative infections are devastating on so many levels, these sterile tools eliminate the possibility of using improperly disinfected instruments. Lowering infection risks, then, fosters a stronger reputation and compliance with accreditation standards.

Fewer trays clogging up your sterile processing department (SPD), of course, improves flow and allows for better use of the department’s sterilizers. That, in turn, creates fewer opportunities for error, potentially reduces problematic bottlenecks that result from waiting for available sterilizers and reduces the overtime these machines need to work.

If you go from six trays to two trays on more common procedures, those numbers add up quickly. Your facility is suddenly free to perform a lot more cases per day. Less time waiting for trays frees your surgical teams to spend more time doing the things that matter most — focusing on the surgery and helping the patients recover as comfortably and efficiently as possible.

It’s important to note that I don’t believe fewer trays to process should translate to fewer staff in SPD. What single-use instruments can do is give your SPD staff the capacity to serve more ORs. Per unit of time, they can generate greater output because of streamlined workflow processes.

Backup plan

In the OR, instruments get dropped, equipment gets misplaced and critical items can break unexpectedly. With single-use instruments, surgeons have multiple backups right there at their disposal.

Think of it in everyday terms, like the difference between daily-use and monthly-use contact lenses. If you wear daily-use contacts and a pair doesn’t feel right, you have another pair immediately available as a backup, and you don’t need to worry as much about the overall impact on your supply.

As savvy as patients are about the many details of their surgical procedures, I believe single-use instruments are likely a bit too “inside baseball” to bring up during discussions about their care plan. For example, I don’t tell patients the color of the titanium metal of the implants I’m using and I don’t explain the pitch spread of the screws.

The goal when I’m talking with patients is to make the best decisions about the most important aspects of their care — whether they should have the surgery, what areas of their anatomy need to be optimized and how we can achieve optimal outcomes using the existing technology and equipment. While single-use instruments certainly fall into the latter category, I don’t always know in advance that these tools are going to be available for everything I’m going to do during surgery. At the end of the day, if I’m the patient, I wouldn’t make a decision to have surgery based on the types of instruments that are being used, either.

On paper, single-use instruments have a higher unit price, but when you factor in overhead related to sterilization, time lost waiting for reprocessing and potential infection expenses, single-use can hold its own — and even result in savings over time. Creating a stable pipeline for these sterile devices means establishing dependable supplier partnerships. Many facilities, especially smaller ASCs, may not store extensive inventories, making “just-in-time” deliveries crucial. A single delay could disrupt an entire day’s surgical schedule, so it’s essential to align with vendors that offer reliable service and a consistent supply.

Future focus

I think the next step for single-use instruments is going to be a convergence with patient-specific implantations. Evolving technology will help improve our understanding of patient pathologies, and we’re going to find some patients require different types of instruments.

We’re eventually going to be able to predict more accurately which instruments and which types of implants will best suit individual patients. Algorithms are already improving so that we have more flexibility in carving that out. Future improvements will allow us to potentially get more patient-specific implants and patient-specific tools so everything is optimized for a patient’s height, weight, body mass index (BMI), disease status, tissue status and more.

That evolution is clearly in line with single-use instrumentation because an implant will literally be optimized for one person. With technology continuing to rapidly evolve, we will soon achieve personalization goals in a more reliable fashion. OSM

Sponsored Content courtesy of ECA MEdical

Can Single-use, Surgery-ready Instrument Sets Create ASC Value?

With an expected 70% of surgeries now moving to the outpatient setting, and more than 20% being for orthopedics, case management, fixed and variable cost savings, staff retention and efficiency are paramount to create a winning business model.

With 52% of the 12,000 U.S. ASCs being physician owned, cost management and process efficiency is critical. That includes reducing dependency on SPD and reusable instrument sets that can slow down a case and require extensive reprocessing, including the use of cleaning agents and steam sterilization, an additional inventory management burden, added inspection steps and a variety of operational risks.

The good news is there are now clinically robust options for surgeons, nurses and ASC business leaders to consider which increase case flow, cut cost, reduce carbon footprint, improve staff retention and provide needed outcomes. At the top of the list is the application of single-use, sterile packed and surgery-ready instrument kits for prep and fixation of a wide range of orthopedic implant procedures in the ASC. These sterile packed instruments coupled with sterile implants are becoming the go-to solution for orthopedic surgery in the ASC.

Industry leader ECA Medical, in Thousand Oaks, Calif., a 46-year-old instrument OEM, partners with popular implant OEMs to develop optimized and tailored instrument sets for a wide range of implant prep and fixation including trauma, foot and ankle, hand and wrist, spine, interventional pain, sports medicine, large joints and robotic instrumentation.

One-way sterile instrument sets containing the optimum number and configuration of instruments are becoming standard practice for upper and lower extremities, trauma, sports medicine, spine and even portions of total joint arthroplasty. The value of single-use surgical instruments goes far beyond convenience. In today’s healthcare environment, where every minute and every outcome matters, the benefits are clear.

First, there are the cost savings. Reusable tools are consigned to the ASC and were the standard of care for decades. However, that delivery, reprocessing and support model is antiquated, requiring constant investment in cleaning, inspection, tracking and replacement, delayed or canceled surgeries and a big carbon footprint. The single-use instrument approach eliminates those ongoing costs entirely.

Second, there’s consistency. With reusable tools, performance can vary from one case to the next, especially if something slips through the reprocessing cracks. Sterile packed kits for the ASC are one-time use, so you get the same high performance every time. Every driver, every handle, every inserter or instrument in the kit is pristine and works as expected. That predictability and reliability removes stress from the surgical workflow and lets teams focus fully on patient care.

Third is safety. Surgical site infections remain one of the most serious complications OR teams face. Single-use surgical instruments eliminate a known source of cross-contamination and reduce the burden on sterile processing teams already stretched thin. By removing the human error associated with cleaning and reusing tools, single-use surgery-ready procedural kits create a cleaner, safer and more cost-effective surgical environment for everyone involved.

—Jim Schultz, vice president of sales & marketing, ECA Medical Instruments