Medical Staples

Staplers

There are multiple types of staplers used in a medical setting. There are staplers specifically designed to be used inside the body or for closure of internal wounds, then there are staplers designed to be used outside the body or for closure of external wounds.

The latter is what we are talking about, commonly known as skin staplers, because their common use case is closure of wounds on the skin.

With regards to skin staplers, they come in various sizes and shapes depending on the specific external use case. For example, a stapler intended to staple shut wounds on the face or hands may be much smaller and may deploy much smaller staplers.

Skin staplers come in either re-loadable or disposable, single-use setups. For our purposes we primarily use the disposable, single-use staplers. They are much cheaper, easier to use and more readily available to folks who aren’t medical professionals.

The disposable, single-use staplers will come preloaded with staples in varying quantities, usually in a multiples of 5.

Staples

Medical staple widths are typically labeled as Regular, Wide, Large and High

Regular and Wide widths are the most common, Large and High are very rare to find for sale.

For our purposes, my recommendation is to seek the Wide width staples when possible, the width difference between Regular and Wide is not vast but the little extra width can make deployment and specifically removal a bit easier.

This diagram shows the staple in the open position (undeployed) and closed position (deployed).

The measurements included will vary slightly by manufacturer, the diagram is shown here to demonstrate the orientation of the positions and to demonstrate the relative differences between Regular and Wide staples.

Removers

Staple removers are separate devices (oftentimes but not always sold with the stapler) used to remove the staple from the skin once it’s been deployed.

In my experience, the “scissor style” removers are more comfortable to use, unless you have meatier fingers.

Technique

Administration

Skin staples are pretty easy to administer safely, in fact in my experience they are difficult to do dangerously. It can be done ineffectively but doing so is rarely dangerous.

Skin staplers are essentially point-and-click.

  1. Grab and hold the stapler with the actuator in your fingers

  2. Firmly press the stapler against the skin, with the head of the stapler centered over where you want the staple to be deployed

  3. Squeeze the actuator firmly and quickly until it bottoms out and the staple is completely deployed

Removal

To remove the staple, use the aforementioned removal tool. The tool has a 2 prong under-1 prong over design.

  1. Insert the 2-prong edge underneath the staple between the staple and the skin, making sure the single prong is above the staple

  2. Squeeze the handle together, bringing the single prong down on the staple and the 2 prongs up

  3. The staple should bend into a shape that looks similar to an ‘M’ or ‘W’ and lift the staple out of the skin