[Evaluation of the healing of skin wounds inflicted by steel scalpels with various degrees of sharpness].
Experiments on 200 animals and clinical use of 300 scalpels differing in the width of the cutting edge showed that operative lineal skin incisions made with a sharp instrument (a ruby knife, razor, scalpel with a 0.8 microns cutting edge) heal better and quicker than those inflicted with a blunt scalpel of serial production with a cutting edge 12.5 microns wide. Such blunting of scapels occurs after two operations and traditional methods of sterilization of the instruments. Mechanical damage of the instruments during cleansing and washing is most important in the clinic.