Patent ID: 7362228

Claim:
An apparatus for identifying surgical instruments comprising: a surgical instrument tray for accommodating one or more surgical instruments; an RF transceiver unit, including a controller and one or more RF antenna transceivers, for projecting an RF field onto at least one surface of the surgical instrument tray to activate an RFID transponder tag associated with a surgical instrument and to receive a signal emitted by the RFID transponder tag, said RF transceiver unit integral to said surgical instrument tray; an activation switch located on at least one surface of the surgical instrument tray; a data processor electrically coupled to the RF transceiver unit, operable to compare the signal emitted by the RFID transponder tag with a value stored in memory; a visual indicator located at least one surface of the surgical instrument tray operable to give a visual indication of a current state of the surgical instrument tray based on the comparison; and a power supply electrically connected to said RF transceiver unit, said activation switch, said data processor, and said visual indicator.