Abstract: The invention concerns a surgical instrument whose distal end region is to be introduced or inserted by a puncture into a cavity of a patient's body. The surgical instrument has an outer trocar sleeve (1) and a trocar mandrel (2) which can be inserted in the latter and is guided in a sliding manner. When slid into an end position, the distal tip (4) of the trocar mandrel (4) projects beyond the end region (3) of the trocar sleeve (1), which end region is inclined relative to the longitudinal axis of the sleeve. In order to keep the distance between the trocar mandrel tip (4) and the distal end (6) of the trocar sleeve (1) as small as possible and to reduce the risk of injury to the patient when the surgical instrument is inserted by a puncture, it is proposed according to the invention that the trocar mandrel tip (4) is eccentric relative to the longitudinal axis of the trocar mandrel and is disposed in the region of the distal end (6) of the trocar sleeve (1) facing the patient.

Abstract: A surgical suture material is provided with a thread (1) and, in some cases, a needle (2) to allow formation of a knot with the greatest possible security while expending little effort, even in situations where space is limited--for example, during an endoscopic operation. The suture material has at least one inherently stable coil, loop or similar preformed feature in at least one initial preformed section (3,4) of its length. Another section of the thread (1) or an end of the thread can be threaded or guided through this preformed feature for the purpose of forming a loop and/or knot. The preformed section can take the form of a preformed feature with an approximately spiral shape, for example.