Arick S.
22.11.2022Verified purchase
Karl, reviewer above, knows what’s up.
Try and price out real latter day surgical tools, see what you come up with. Most cheapo stuff made in Pakistan these days. Legit stuff costs $$$. Do the homework and see, modify by use case, and then prepare to vomit out of your nostrils upon seening the true coinage needed to outfit an end-of-days self-appendectomy kit, or something similar. Vet tools can be stopgaps, but even those can add up into the hundreds pretty quick.
For various reasons, I took a gamble on this ensemble and I am 100% completely satisfied. All look to be credible, capable, serious tools. A brief comparison with some Amazon kellys and Adson’s shows the difference between quality and garbage. Sure, the 10 dollar needle drivers I got from China are good enough to sew up a chicken, but for apocalypse-level prepping these Swedish tools are more in line with what a hard pressed end user would want to reach for.
A few observations: this assortment contains needle drivers in the “european” style. Several (redundant) types of forceps, on whcih all of the teeth appear well aligned. Grinding and finishing of the cutting surfaces seems high quality. Various manufacturers, as described above. Good variety. Plenty of tools to do simple (think office Internal Medicine) procedures, or for anything a more enterprising non-surgical proceduralist might wish to try. Most of the disposable surgical trays I’ve used contained things represented here, but these aren’t the chitzy disposable scissors that don’t cut, or the kochers that don’t really clamp. No scalpel handle or blades, but those are easy enough to source and you don’t want to screw around sharpening a vintage scalpel anyway. The bowls in particular are extremely solid. No flat tray. No real rongeurs or bone tools, but I have no desire (or license) to get that kind of elbow deep.
I’m going to autoclave some and see how they fare (a weak link for bottom dollar samples).
This website has a few “diamonds” in the rough, and this set is unqestionably one of them.
Karl K.
15.08.2021Verified purchase
I'm a head and neck surgeon and was thrilled to buy over 70 pieces of surgical instruments and Swedish history for almost nothing. Mostly extinct manufacturers like Saba, Kirurgiska Instrument Fabriks Aktiebolaget (KIFA), now part of Siemens and C.V. Heljestrand, a few things made by Stille, which is still around making quality equipment that can last a hundred years. A fine addition to any prepper stash. While sad that my country is selling this stuff for what I assume is cents on the dollar, it makes me happy that it will end up in the hands of some based Varusteleka customers.