Surgical gown with functional window

Abstract

A surgical gown for protecting the wearer while maintaining the sterile field, and further offering the wearer the ability to directly access and interface with technological equipment being operated during a surgical procedure. The surgical gown comprising one or more functional windows positioned on the gown to allow the wearer to interface in a sterile manner with a device attached to the wearer underneath the gown, for example a device attached to the wearer's arm and / or chest. The windows disposed in the gown are sized and adapted to accommodate a variety of devices including cameras for POV filming and / or recording, as well as control displays for local or remotely located technological equipment.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]This application claims priority to Canadian Patent Application No. (to be assigned) filed 6 May 2014 which application is herein expressly incorporated by reference.FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0002]The present invention relates to the field of protective garments such as surgical gowns and, in particular, to surgical gowns having one or more functional windows configured to allow the wearer to access and control accessory equipment under sterile conditions.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0003]Creating and maintaining a sterile field is an essential component to reducing the risk of post-surgical infections in patients by decreasing the likelihood that infectious agents will invade the body during clinical procedures. A sterile field is an area created by placing sterile surgical drapes around the patient's surgical site and on the stand that will hold sterile instruments and other items needed during surgery. When a surgical team member has donne...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The present invention provides a surgical gown with one or more functional windows that allow the wearer to access and control accessory equipment under sterile conditions. The windows are flexible and transparent, allowing the wearer to directly interface with the device in a sterile way. The gown can be designed with a pair of sleeves and a window in each sleeve or a front body portion with a centrally placed flexible and transparent window. This allows the wearer to access and control the camera or recording device in a sterile manner.

Problems solved by technology

Maintaining a sterile field is not an easy task as there are many opportunities for a breach in sterility during set-up and maintenance of the sterile area.

Medical equipment having a high level of technological complexity, introduced into the operating room, requires members of the surgical team to directly interface with these devices.

This can be challenging in environments in which a sterile field must be maintained.

Alternatively, expensive voice activated equipment may be used to allow the sterile member to directly control the surgical equipment, for example Google Glass™.

Overall, these methods tend to be costly, as well as imprecise, prone to error resulting from miscommunication or errors inherent to voice activated technology.

In such circumstances, the need to maintain a sterile field can further restrict the ability of sterile members to operate equipment such as telecommunication devices (cell phones, tablets, computers) in order to access email and EMR charts, for example.

Such methods, however, do not provide a true “surgeon's view” of the surgical procedure, since the cameras are not necessarily facing the same direction as the surgeon.

Despite the additional support provided by the described frame, the weight of the equipment, that in many cases must be held on the surgeon's head for long periods of time, places great stress on the neck and upper back leading to fatigue, headaches, stiff necks, muscular pain, and bruising.

Eventually, there is the potential for prolapsed vertebrae to occur due to the surgeon supporting the weight of the head gear while looking down for extended periods of time into the surgical field.

In addition, head movement during the surgical procedure can result in excessive camera shake and a poor surgical video.

Images