Patent ID: 7896869

Claim:
A system for managing medical instrument use during a surgical procedure, the system comprising: a plurality of medical instrument trays, each of the plurality of medical trays including a plurality of medical instrument storage receptacles, a plurality of medical instruments, each medical instrument being positioned in one of the plurality of medical instrument storage receptacles, an actuator having a light source coupled thereto, a controller to ensure each medical instrument of the plurality of medical instruments is used in an order of use defined by a predefined surgical procedure, the controller ensuring the order of use by sequentially choosing each medical instrument of the plurality of medical instruments in the order defined by the predefined surgical procedure and sequentially generating actuator commands to direct light produced by the light source toward the chosen medical instrument positioned in one of the plurality of medical instrument storage receptacles to guide a user to the chosen medical instrument positioned in the medical instrument storage receptacle of the medical instrument tray, and a plurality of feedback devices, each feedback device of the plurality of feedback devices being associated with a medical instrument of the plurality of medical instruments and actuatable to notify the controller when the user has selected the medical instrument associated with the feedback device for use.