Here is the shape of a hospital’s instrument estate, before any discussion of brands or budgets: Specialty Core sets to stock Sets per theatre (typical) Dominant cost driver General surgery Major laparotomy, minor, appendicectomy, hernia, cholecystectomy 3–4 majors Turnover rate, not unit price Obstetrics & gynaecology Caesarean, hysterectomy, D&C, delivery 4–6 caesarean Emergency availability Orthopaedics […]

A surgeon sends a sketch and a photograph of a modified Kocher with the jaw ground back at an angle they have been using for years. They want two hundred of them, branded, with their hospital’s catalogue number laser-marked on the shank. What happens next is where most custom instrument projects succeed or quietly die.

Two findings from recent tray-optimisation research are worth putting side by side before any inventory discussion starts. A university hospital that systematically reviewed its instrument trays across specialties cut tray types by 17%, instruments per tray by 18%, and total instruments held by 16% — without reducing what surgeons had available to them. Separately, modelling