Package for retaining a suture and a suture anchor

Abstract

A package consists of a plastic 'card' made up of a flat, rectangular piece of material having a centrally located scoring allowing the piece of material to be folded upon itself to provide an inner enclosure. The card includes two halves to either side of the scoring, a first half including cut-outs forming two tabs that enmesh with two slots formed in the second half so that when the card is folded about the scoring, the tabs may be inserted into the slots to hold the card in the folded configuration. The second half has a series of slots of various configurations and located in desired locations to allow retention of a guide wire, suture and suture anchor in a desired configuration. Adjacent slots provided for receipt of the guide wire are laterally misaligned to cause the guide wire to be slightly bowed when inserted through these adjacent slots, thereby facilitating a creation of frictional forces that act to retain the guide wire in its mounted position on the second half of the card, absent application of a removing force. Slots are provided permitting the suture to be easily removed from the card by pulling it in one direction. At the end of the suture, the suture anchor is retained by a loop of the suture extending through an opening in the proximal end of the suture anchor. Slots are formed on a top edge of the second half of the card and the suture is wound across this third pair of slots between the guide wire and the second pair of slots. Between the two slots forming a third pair of slots, the user may easily grasp the suture and, with a pulling motion, may remove the guide wire, the suture and the suture anchor.