Procedures and skills

Rinsing the ear canal with a gentle stream of warm fluid to remove earwax, discharge or a foreign object.

A gradual dip in the fetal heart rate that starts, bottoms out and ends at the same times as a uterine contraction.

Doing a task with the fewest, safest movements, as the scrub does when setting up and running the sterile field.

Fluid that flows out of the body or a device, such as the used fluid drained after peritoneal dialysis.

A test that records the heart's electrical activity as waves on paper or a screen.

A treatment for some severe mental illnesses in which a brief electric current is passed through the brain under anesthesia to cause a short seizure.

Using high-frequency electric current through a handheld tool to cut tissue or seal bleeding vessels during surgery.

Raising something up, such as a body part above the level of the heart, or a rise in a value.

Surgical removal of an embolus, a clot or other mass that has traveled and lodged in an artery.

Blocking a blood vessel from the inside on purpose with injected material; also, a clot or plaque breaking loose and blocking a vessel downstream.

A join between the cut ends of two tubular structures, such as bowel or blood vessels, sewn or stapled so they line up as one continuous tube.

Surgical removal of plaque from inside an artery, leaving the smooth outer wall behind.

A thin tube with a light and a camera that is passed into the body to look inside an organ or cavity.

Done with an endoscope, a thin tube with a light and camera passed into the body.

A procedure that uses a scope passed through the mouth, with dye and X-rays, to see and treat the bile and pancreatic ducts.

A procedure that uses a thin, flexible tube with a light and camera to look inside the body.

Inside the trachea, the windpipe.

Putting a breathing tube through the mouth or nose into the windpipe (trachea).

A flexible plastic tube passed through the mouth or nose into the windpipe to keep the airway open and allow breathing support.

Liquid put into the rectum and lower bowel through the anus.

A tube placed into the stomach or small intestine to give liquid food, water and drugs to a person who cannot eat enough by mouth.

Liquid nutrition given through a tube into the stomach or small intestine.

Surgical removal of the whole eyeball, after cutting its muscles and the optic nerve.

A way of wrapping an item for sterilization with the item set diagonally on the wrap and the corners folded over one at a time.

Pain relief or numbness from an anesthetic drug given through a thin catheter into the space just outside the covering of the spinal cord.

A cut made in the perineum, the tissue between the vagina and the anus, during birth to widen the opening.

Thick, dry, dark dead tissue that covers part or all of a wound.

To turn outward or inside out, as when an eyelid is flipped to show its inner surface or wound edges are turned out.

At two-hour intervals, around the clock unless the order says otherwise; written q2h.

Cutting out tissue, such as a growth or damaged area, during surgery.

A biopsy that removes the whole lump or suspicious area, usually with a rim of normal tissue around it.

Surgical removal of all the contents of a body cavity; in the eye, of everything in the orbit, usually for cancer.

The date after which a drug, supply or product should no longer be used.

Surgery that opens the abdomen to look for and treat a problem that less invasive tests have not found or cannot treat.

In surgery, opening and holding a wound so the surgeon can see and reach the tissue, while the tissue held aside is protected.

Straightening a joint so that the angle between the two body parts gets larger, or bending the neck or trunk back.

Holding a broken bone in place from outside the body with a frame joined to pins or wires that go through the skin into the bone.

The leaking of an IV drug that damages tissue (a vesicant) out of the vein into the surrounding tissue.

Taking out a breathing tube, usually at the end of anesthesia once the patient breathes well alone and the protective reflexes are back.

Fluid, cells or other material that has leaked out of blood vessels into a wound or tissue.