A First Scrub, Step by Step

In practice

Ellis is a student on a clinical placement, scrubbing for the first time under a preceptor's eye. Before entering the scrub area, Ellis removes a watch and a ring and checks that the nails are short and unpolished. Ellis puts on a head covering, eye protection and a mask, checking the mask covers the nose and mouth. In the operating room, Ellis opens the gown pack onto a clean surface and opens a pair of gloves and an extra pair onto its wrapper. At the scrub sink, the facility uses an antimicrobial soap scrub. Ellis wets the hands and forearms, scrubs every surface for the time on the product's label, rinses, and walks into the room with hands held in front, touching nothing. Ellis dries with the sterile towel from the gown pack, lifts the folded gown straight up, steps back into open space and lets it unfold. The hands go into the armholes and stop inside the sleeves. The circulating nurse secures the back. Ellis turns the glove packet so the fingers point toward the body, flips the first glove onto the palm through the sleeve, pulls its cuff over the gown cuff, then tugs the sleeve so the hand slides in. The second glove goes on the same way, then the outer pair. The preceptor points out one slip: Ellis's thumb touched the edge of the cuff while flipping the second glove. Ellis says so, and the preceptor talks through what the facility's procedure requires.