Scrubs: How Did They Get Here?

Most people assume scrubs have always been the standard in hospitals. They haven't. Before the mid-20th century, surgeons wore their own clothes into the operating room — no dedicated uniform, no colour coding.

IRG scrubs represent the end point of a long, practical evolution that started with basic hygiene concerns and turned into a multi-billion dollar industry. Here's how it actually happened.

When Did Scrubs First Appear in Hospitals?

Scrubs first appeared in a recognisable form in the 1940s, but they didn't become a standard hospital uniform until the 1970s.

In the early 1900s, operating rooms had almost no dress code. Surgeons wore street clothes, sometimes with a basic apron.

The first real move toward dedicated surgical wear came after germ theory became widely accepted in medicine — hospitals started requiring white gowns in the 1910s and 1920s to signal cleanliness.

White lasted for a few decades, but it created a real problem in the OR. Under the bright surgical lights of the 1950s, white caused significant eye strain for surgeons during long procedures.

Hospitals started switching to green and grey tones to reduce that glare. That practical fix is what gave scrubs their now-familiar muted colour palette.

By the 1970s, the two-piece scrub set — a simple V-neck top and drawstring trousers — had become the default operating room uniform across most US hospitals.

How Did Scrubs Move Beyond the Operating Room?

Scrubs spread to general wards, clinics, and dental offices through the 1980s and 1990s, largely driven by infection control policy changes.

The AIDS crisis in the mid-1980s pushed hospitals to tighten how staff dressed.

Personal clothing was harder to control and launder to clinical standards. Scrubs, by contrast, could be washed at high temperatures, tracked, and replaced easily.

Hospitals started requiring them beyond the OR — first in emergency departments, then in general wards.

By the late 1990s, scrubs had become the default uniform across nearly all clinical settings in the United States.

One commonly cited industry estimate from that period suggested more than 80% of acute care clinical staff wore scrubs as their primary work uniform. That figure has only grown since.

What Did the First Scrubs Actually Look Like?

Early scrubs were boxy, plain, and came in a narrow range of colours — mostly seafoam green, surgical grey, or navy.

There was no gender-specific cut. The same oversized V-neck top was issued to everyone. Fabric was almost always 100% cotton or a basic poly-cotton blend.

Cotton held up to industrial washing reasonably well, but it didn't move with the body, it wrinkled badly, and it absorbed moisture without releasing it — not ideal for a 12-hour shift.

Pockets were minimal. Fit was not a consideration. If you wore scrubs in a hospital in 1980, you were essentially wearing a hospital-issued pyjama set. Functional, yes. Comfortable over a long shift, not really.

How Have Scrubs Changed Over the Last Two Decades?

The biggest changes came after 2000, when fabric technology and fit finally became priorities in scrub design.

Polyester-rayon-spandex blends replaced cotton as the go-to fabric for performance scrubs. These blends offer four-way stretch, moisture-wicking, and colour retention across repeated wash cycles.

A modern performance scrub can go through 50 or more industrial wash cycles before showing significant wear — early cotton scrubs degraded much faster.

Fit changed significantly too. Tailored cuts for different body shapes entered the market between roughly 2005 and 2015.

High-rise waistbands, tapered legs, fitted sleeves, and women-specific proportions became standard options rather than exceptions.

The numbers reflect how seriously the industry started taking all of this.

The global medical scrubs market was valued at around 12.2 billion dollars in 2022, according to industry research, and is projected to keep growing through 2030.

That's a market that barely existed as a commercial category before the 1990s.

Colour coding also became more structured. Many hospitals now assign scrub colours by department — navy for nursing staff, green for surgical teams, ceil blue for respiratory therapy.

A 2016 study in the Journal of Nursing Management found patients were notably better at identifying staff roles when departments used distinct scrub colours consistently.

FAQs

Were scrubs always called scrubs?

Not exactly. Early surgical wear was often just referred to as "OR attire" or "surgical dress."

The term "scrubs" came from the practice of "scrubbing in" — the sterile hand-washing process surgeons go through before entering an operating room. Over time, the uniform worn during that process took on the same name.

Do all countries use scrubs the same way?

No. Scrub adoption varies significantly by country. In the UK, for example, many NHS trusts issued their own uniforms rather than leaving scrub selection to individual staff.

In the US, staff typically purchase their own scrubs, which is part of why the commercial scrub market grew so large. In some Asian countries, traditional white uniforms remained standard in hospitals well into the 2000s.

How often should clinical scrubs be washed?

Most infection control guidelines recommend washing scrubs after every shift.

The CDC advises that healthcare workers either use a facility laundering service or wash scrubs at home at the highest recommended temperature for the fabric.

Mixing scrubs with regular personal laundry is generally discouraged in clinical guidelines, though compliance in practice varies.

Has the pandemic changed how scrubs are made?

Yes, noticeably. After 2020, demand for antimicrobial fabric treatments increased sharply. Several manufacturers introduced scrubs with built-in antimicrobial or fluid-resistant coatings.

There was also a significant spike in demand for disposable scrub alternatives in high-exposure clinical environments, particularly in ICU and emergency settings during peak COVID periods.

Are scrubs regulated by any official body?

In the US, scrubs are not classified as medical devices, so they aren't regulated by the FDA.

However, specific garments marketed as having antimicrobial or fluid-resistant properties may be subject to FTC guidelines around advertising claims.

Hospitals themselves often set internal standards for scrub material, colour, and fit through their own dress code policies, which vary widely by institution.

That internal variation is one reason options like IRG scrubs exist across such a wide range of specs and styles.