Patent ID: 7070414

Claim:
In a method for cleaning and sterilizing medical and dental instruments, which method includes the steps of collecting such instruments used in a plurality of medical or dental procedures after use thereof in such plurality of procedures, cleaning such collected instruments, sterilizing such cleaned instruments, and segregating and sorting such sterilized instruments into groups according to the particular surgical or medical procedure for which they are intended, and storing such groups of sterilized instruments until the next use thereof the improved method comprising the steps in sequence of (a) initially banding each group of such instruments together after use thereof in a particular medical or dental procedure, such that each such banded group includes only the instruments used for that particular procedure; (b) collecting a plurality of such banded groups of instruments; (c) cleaning and sterilizing such plurality of banded groups of instruments; and (d) storing such cleaned, sterilized banded groups until the next use thereof.