Surgical Assistant Assist in operations, under the supervision of surgeons. May, in accordance with state laws, help surgeons to make incisions and close surgical sites, manipulate or remove tissues, implant surgical devices or drains, suction the surgical site, place catheters, clamp or cauterize vessels or tissue, and apply dressings to surgical site.
Surgical Assistant is Also Know as
In different settings, Surgical Assistant is titled as
- Certified First Assistant (CFA)
- Certified Registered Nurse First Assistant (CRNFA)
- Certified Surgical Assistant (CSA)
- Certified Surgical First Assistant (CSFA)
- Certified Surgical Technician
- Gastrointestinal Technician (GI Technician)
- Registered Nurse First Assistant (RNFA)
- Surgical First Assistant
- Surgical Scrub Technician (Surgical Scrub Tech)
- Surgical Technician (Surgical Tech)
Education and Training of Surgical Assistant
Surgical Assistant is categorized in Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed
Experience Required for Surgical Assistant
Previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is required for these occupations. For example, an electrician must have completed three or four years of apprenticeship or several years of vocational training, and often must have passed a licensing exam, in order to perform the job.
Education Required for Surgical Assistant
Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree.
Degrees Related to Surgical Assistant
- Bachelor in Surgical Technology/Technologist
- Associate Degree Courses in Surgical Technology/Technologist
- Masters Degree Courses in Surgical Technology/Technologist
Training Required for Surgical Assistant
Employees in these occupations usually need one or two years of training involving both on-the-job experience and informal training with experienced workers. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.
Related Ocuupations
Some Ocuupations related to Surgical Assistant in different industries are
- Surgical Technologists
- Anesthesiologist Assistants
- Emergency Medical Technicians
- Paramedics
- Cardiovascular Technologists and Technicians
- Medical Assistants
- Ophthalmic Medical Technicians
- Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses
- Respiratory Therapists
- Nursing Assistants
- Pediatric Surgeons
- Emergency Medicine Physicians
- Orthopedic Surgeons, Except Pediatric
- Physician Assistants
- Anesthesiologists
- Nurse Anesthetists
- Critical Care Nurses
- Nurse Practitioners
- Cardiologists
- Acute Care Nurses
What Do Surgical Assistant do?
- Adjust and maintain operating room temperature, humidity, or lighting, according to surgeon's specifications.
- Apply sutures, staples, clips, or other materials to close skin, facia, or subcutaneous wound layers.
- Assess skin integrity or other body conditions upon completion of the procedure to determine if damage has occurred from body positioning.
- Assist in the insertion, positioning, or suturing of closed-wound drainage systems.
- Assist members of surgical team with gowning or gloving.
- Clamp, ligate, or cauterize blood vessels to control bleeding during surgical entry, using hemostatic clamps, suture ligatures, or electrocautery equipment.
- Coordinate or participate in the positioning of patients, using body stabilizing equipment or protective padding to provide appropriate exposure for the procedure or to protect against nerve damage or circulation impairment.
- Coordinate with anesthesia personnel to maintain patient temperature.
- Discuss with surgeon the nature of the surgical procedure, including operative consent, methods of operative exposure, diagnostic or laboratory data, or patient-advanced directives or other needs.
- Incise tissue layers in lower extremities to harvest veins.
- Maintain an unobstructed operative field, using surgical retractors, sponges, or suctioning and irrigating equipment.
- Monitor and maintain aseptic technique throughout procedures.
- Monitor patient intra-operative status, including patient position, vital signs, or volume and color of blood.
- Postoperatively inject a subcutaneous local anesthetic agent to reduce pain.
- Prepare and apply sterile wound dressings.
- Assist in applying casts, splints, braces, or similar devices.
- Assist in volume replacement or autotransfusion techniques.
- Assist with patient resuscitation during cardiac arrest or other life-threatening events.
- Cover patients with surgical drapes to create and maintain a sterile operative field.
- Determine availability of necessary equipment or supplies for operative procedures.
- Gather, arrange, or assemble instruments or supplies.
- Insert or remove urinary bladder catheters.
- Obtain or inspect sterile or non-sterile surgical equipment, instruments, or supplies.
- Operate sterilizing devices.
- Pass instruments or supplies to surgeon during procedure.
- Remove patient hair or disinfect incision sites to prepare patient for surgery.
- Transport patients to operating room.
- Verify the identity of patient or operative site.
Qualities of Good Surgical Assistant
- Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
- Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
- Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
- Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
- Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
- Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
- Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
- Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
- Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
- Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
- Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
- Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
- Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
- Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
- Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
- Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
- Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
- Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
- Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
- Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
- Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
- Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
- Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
- Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
- Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
- Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
- Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
- Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
- Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
- Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
- Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
- Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
- Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
- Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
- Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
- Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
- Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
- Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
- Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
- Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
Tools Used by Surgical Assistant
- Anesthesia carts
- Angiocaths
- Argon beam coagulators
- Automated external defibrillators AED
- Blanket warmer cabinets
- Blood warming equipment
- Body stabilizers
- C-arm tables
- Carbon dioxide CO2 lasers
- Cardiac monitoring equipment
- Cast cutting saws
- Cauterizing equipment
- Cell savers
- Desktop computers
- Endoscopic camera/video systems
- Ethylene oxide sterilizers
- Eye lasers
- Eye magnets
- Fiberoptic endoscopes
- Flash sterilizers
- Fluid warmers
- Head stabilizers
- Heart pacemakers
- Hemostat clamps
- Hospital intercom equipment
- Hypothermia units
- Intravenous IV sets
- Laparoscopes
- Laptop computers
- Mayo stands
- Medical image processing printers
- Medical staple kits
- Multi-line telephone systems
- Neodymium-doped yttrium aluminum garnet Nd:YAG lasers
- Nerve stimulators
- Pagers
- Patient positioning devices
- Patient transport stretchers
- Personal computers
- Pneumatic tourniquets
- Powered surgical drills
- Pressure steam autoclaves
- Specimen collection containers
- Sterile drapes
- Sterile gowns
- Subcutaneous injection syringes
- Suction machines
- Surgical clamps
- Surgical dermatomes
- Surgical fracture tables
- Surgical gloves
- Surgical masks
- Surgical protective goggles
- Surgical razors
- Surgical retractors
- Surgical robots
- Surgical scalpels
- Surgical trocars
- Suture kits
- Telethermometers
- Urinary catheters
- Vascular clamps
- Wound drains
Technology Skills required for Surgical Assistant
- Electronic medical record EMR software
- MEDITECH software
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Office software
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- Nursing documentation software
- Patient scheduling software
- Patient tracking software
- Supply documentation software
- Surgery workflow communication software
- Word processing software