Please help us fund state-of-the-art cautery equipment

Every year, thousands of patients receive excellent care at the Meaford Hospital. The generous support from people like you ensures we have the critical equipment needed to improve the lives of our patients.

Thank you for your ongoing commitment to the Meaford Hospital Foundation and to loyal community members like you helping to raise the funds needed to purchase ERBE VIO 3 cautery equipment for the OR (operating room) at the Meaford Hospital.

Cauterization during surgical procedures isn’t a subject commonly discussed with patients because it is part of the international standard of surgical care. However, having the proper tools to carry out these procedures is something we can’t do without.

Much like other machines in our lives, whether it be a car, a washing machine, a refrigerator – or even a cell phone – nothing lasts forever, and the existing cautery equipment in Meaford’s OR has reached the end of its life expectancy.

Since antiquity, cauterization has been used to stop heavy bleeding.

Cauterization in medicine is the practice of using heat to burn a part of the body to stop bleeding or remove tissue. Cauterization stops bleeding because the extreme heat source essentially melts or seals the wound and the blood vessels in and around it.

The primary benefit of cauterization is that it stops bleeding quickly and effectively. This may help avoid future tissue injury and lower the chance of infection. Cauterization also helps reduce pain associated with the procedure as well as any scarring that may occur afterwards.

Tools used in the ancient cauterization process ranged from heated lances to cauterizing knives, heated over fire and applied to the wound. This caused tissues and blood to heat rapidly to extreme temperatures, causing coagulation of the blood and thus controlling the bleeding, at the cost of extensive tissue damage.

As barbaric as it sounds, it saved lives.

Thankfully, the cauterization tools we use today bear no resemblance to those in centuries past.

While the purpose hasn’t changed – controlling bleeding – today’s equipment accomplishes the same end with electrical pulses – and without damaging surrounding tissue.

Conventional devices produce variable voltage and constant wattage, which allows for surges and possible overexposure for tissue. The ERBE device differs as it produces con
stant voltage (power) and wattage that can be adjusted, depending on the tissue being worked on.

Replacement of existing equipment with the ERBE VIO 3 will ensure our surgeons have stateof- the-art cautery equipment to control blood flow during procedures. It is critical to have a bloodless field in which to operate.

With the government providing little funding for medical equipment, we must rely on the generosity of people in our community to meet the needs of our hospital. I hope we can count on you to help us with this and other important purchases that will enable us to maintain a high standard of local care for the people who call Grey Bruce their home.

Please help us fund this state-of-the-art cautery equipment so we can continue delivering the very best surgical care to our community.

With my sincere gratitude,

Dr. A.M. Lozon
General Surgeon
Grey Bruce Health Services

P.S. Please help us continue to provide expert care for every patient who comes to the Meaford Hospital by giving as generously as you can today. Thank you.