[History of surgical instruments: 4. The Deschamp ligation needle for the Overholt forceps: development of instruments for blood-saving tissue preparation].

The development of effective ligature carrying forceps is described, which are useful in dissection. The ligature needle, which has been developed by the French surgeon J.F.L. Deschamp (1740-1824), is presented on the basis of his original publication from 1793. Today many surgeons use a ligature forceps, which has been developed in 1938 by R.H. Overholt (b. 1901) in Boston and was modified by R. Geissendörfer (1902-1976) in the 1950s.