Medical Tubing

Medical tubing is made from a variety of materials and typically sterilized and small in diameter. Glass, metal, plastic, and rubber silicone tubing are used in a variety of medical applications. Some medical tubing features diameters that measure in the thousandths of an inch, with walls thinner than a human hair. These small, specialty tubes can cost many times more than conventional high-volume tubes, but are well-suited for catheters and other medical devices that are inserted into a patient’s cardiovascular system. In general, medical tubing manufacturers seek to reduce the outside diameter (OD) of their products while maintaining as large an inside diameter (ID) as possible. Tubes with larger IDs provide doctors and other medical personnel with more room to insert tools or deliver drugs. Examples of medical tubing include surgical tubes and hypodermic tubes.  

Important specifications for medical tubing include not only OD and ID, but also wall thickness. To produce medical tubing with extremely thin walls, manufacturers force material to flow through the small orifices of processing equipment. Gear or melt pumps are often used in the extrusion of very small tubes. To minimize flow problems, some suppliers use special tooling designs and materials for thin-wall extrusion. Examples include polyether block amides, which are plasticizer-free thermoplastic elastomers that are often used in catheter tubing for angiographies, angioplasties, endoscopies, and biopsies. Specialized manufacturing processes are used to produce medical tubing with a soft, flexible tip and a stiff body. For example, in a single-step process called total intermittent extrusion, tubes are produced as integral parts rather than separate pieces bonded together. 

Medical tubing manufacturers produce multilayer tubes that include reinforcements made from many layers of different materials. Typically, tubing is extruded and braided over with wire or polymer. An outer jacket is extruded over the braiding and the tube is drawn through a hot die to fuse the different layers together. The use of lubricious inner layers produces medical tubing into which doctors and other medical personnel can slide guide wires. The inner layer can also serve as a barrier between the outer material and substances traveling through the tube.

Additional specifications for medical tubing include minimum bend radius and pressure rating. Minimum bend radius is based on acceptable levels of tubing cross-section deformation. It is usually expressed in inches. Rated pressure, which is measured in pounds per square inch (psi), is the short term burst pressure at 75° F.

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Part Numbers for Medical Tubing