Potts-Smith Dressing Forceps 21cm — Pulmonary Surgery

Potts-Smith Dressing Forceps — 21cm Pulmonary Surgery

The 21cm-labelled Potts-Smith serves lung-resection surgery — lobectomy and pneumonectomy procedures requiring delicate handling of pulmonary-vein and pulmonary-artery branches that the lung-cancer dissection must skeletonise before division. Pulmonary vessels are thin-walled and friable in the patient with emphysema (the typical lung-cancer patient profile), and forceps that crush these vessels produce intra-operative haemorrhage that disrupts the operative flow.

The lobectomy vessel-handling sequence

Pulmonary-vein dissection → vein skeletonised with peanut dissectors → vein controlled with the 21cm Potts-Smith holding the adventitia → vascular stapler applied → vein divided. The Potts-Smith’s role at this step is to lift the vein gently away from surrounding tissue so the stapler can be positioned cleanly; the lighter grip avoids the intimal damage that produces post-operative vein-stump thrombosis.

VATS and the 21cm length

Video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) typically uses dedicated endoscopic instruments through 5-10mm ports, but conversion to open thoracotomy occurs in 5-10% of cases. The conversion tray maintains the 21cm Potts-Smith for the open-procedure backup. The same forceps lives on the conversion tray for robotic lung surgery as well.