Green Fenestrated Towel
Date1956
Object NameTowel
Mediumlinen
ClassificationsMedicine and Healthcare
DimensionsOverall: Height: 139.7 cm, Width: 78.74 cm
AcquisitionKenneth A Webster Nursing Collection.
LocationView by Appointment
Object numberABDMS029469
About MeGreen fenestrated theatre drape or towel. embroidered in white in one corner "per", proably abbreviation of "perineum" indicating that the towel was for use in gynaecology. Used to cover around operation sites and patient; the operation itself was covered by a fenestrated towe lthrough which the surgeon operated. The patient was "toweled up" or drape by the surgeon and theater nurse (Or scrub nurse); carefully unrolling and positioning the sterlile sheets/towels/drapes ensuring that the sterlile materials remained uncontaminated. Green was used to indicate that the linen had been sterilised. Martin Nichols was the pioneer of this system, believing that it was kinder on the eyes of the conscious patients he was operating on in nureo- surgery. The towels are folded as they would have been prior to being packed in dressing drums. In use in the theatre they would have been held in position by means of sterlile towel foreceps.
1930 - 1940
