ClearCount SmartSponge

ClearCount sponges pull double lifesaving duty. After soaking up blood during a surgery, they alert docs before they can be accidentally sewn up inside a patient—a potentially fatal mistake that requires a lengthy hospital stay and antibiotics to clear up. A table-side scanner keeps continuous tabs on the location of the radio-frequency ID tag securely embedded in each sponge and counts how many have gone into the patient. Once the doctor finishes the operation, he simply waves the RFID wand over the patient to ensure that he or she is sponge-free.
$20–$30/procedure; clearcount.com