Medical Equipment Glossary

The removal of foreign material and devitalized or contaminated tissue from or adjacent to a traumatic or infected lesion until surrounding healthy tissue is exposed.

A medical equipment device that is used to administer an electric shock to the heart in order to reestablish normal heart rhythm.

An apparatus used for measuring the optical density of a material.

A surgical instrument used to produce thin slices of skin from a donor area, in order to use them for making skin grafts.

A closed, sealable vessel (usually made of heavy glass) which contains a desiccant (such as a silica gel). A desiccator is used in laboratories for protecting moisture-sensitive materials and protecting sensitive materials from humidity.

In the measurement of blood pressure, the bottom of the two blood pressure numbers refers to the diastolic measurement. The term refers to the period of time between two contactions in which the heart is at rest and the ventricles have relaxed.

Also known as bipolar electrocautery, this is one of the two types of electrocautery. With this type, the active and receiving electrodes are both placed at the site of cauterization. The probe is usually in the shape of a forceps with each tine forming one electrode, cauterizing only the tissue between the electrodes.

Dissection is the process or disassembling and observing something to determine its internal structure.  In medical pathology, dissection refers to a tear in the wall of a blood vessel. The term also applies to the separation of the layers of arterial tissue in the aorta as a result of blood being forced out into the wall of the aorta through a tear in the innermost layer of tissue. See also: tissue dissection.