Iconoclast Breast Spreader – Blunt Blades, Two Sizes

A spreader differs from a retractor in that it holds tissue apart from within rather than pulling it back from an edge. In breast surgery the working space is a pocket created beneath the gland or muscle, and it closes the moment nothing holds it. Blunt blades placed inside that pocket keep it open and give the surgeon a lit, visible cavity without an assistant maintaining constant traction.

The blades are blunt for a specific reason: they bear against glandular tissue and the undersurface of skin over a long period, not against bone. Pressure spread across a smooth, rounded blade is tolerated; a narrow or sharp edge held at the same force concentrates it and produces bruising, fat necrosis or worse in tissue whose cosmetic outcome is the entire point of the operation. The two sizes exist because pocket depth varies widely with the procedure — a blade too long for a small pocket tents the skin, one too short falls out of a deep one.

Specifications