Medical Team Order Checklist: How to Plan Custom Jackets, Scrub Caps, Names, Roles, and Sizes

Ordering apparel for one person is easy. Ordering for a whole unit is a different job: twelve names spelled correctly, the right credential after each one, sizes nobody guessed at, and a colour everyone can actually live with. This checklist walks through planning a custom medical apparel order for a team, step by step, so the details get settled before anything goes into a cart.

One thing worth knowing up front: jackets and scrub caps are planned differently. Jackets carry free-text personalization and need a size and colour from every person. Embroidered scrub caps are fixed role and specialty designs with no size to collect at all. That difference shapes most of this checklist.

Why a checklist prevents most team-order mistakes

Almost every problem with a group apparel order traces back to information collected too casually. A name taken from memory instead of a badge. A size someone guessed on a colleague's behalf. A credential that sounds right but does not match what the person actually holds. None of these are complicated problems, but personalized items are made to the details you supply, so it is worth getting them right the first time.

A checklist also makes the order reviewable. When every name, role, size, and colour sits in one place, a second person can check it in a few minutes, which is far easier than reconstructing decisions from a group chat.

Step 1: Choose the product types

Start by deciding what the team is actually getting. Mixing two or three pieces is common, and each one is planned differently.

Fleece jackets

Our custom medical fleece jackets are the warm option, made from soft polyester fleece with a full-zip design. The main healthcare style lets you add a name, title, and department to the chest, and it is offered in sizes S through 4XL with a female and male fit to choose from.

Some fleece styles are department-specific rather than blank. The emergency nurse fleece jacket carries "EMERGENCY" down the sleeve and an ER heartbeat design on the back while still personalizing the chest with a name and credentials, and the critical care fleece jacket does the same for ICU teams. If your unit has a natural identity, these save you from having to spell it out in embroidery.

Dry-fit jackets

The custom medical dry-fit jacket is the lighter, moisture-wicking option, and its product copy calls it out as a fit for group orders and medical teams. It supports the widest personalization of anything here: a name or title, a department, and a logo or graphic, with embroidery available on the chest, back, and sleeve. Sizes run S through 3XL. For a deeper look at what goes where, see our dry-fit jacket guide.

Not sure which jacket suits the team? Our fleece vs dry-fit comparison lays out the trade-offs.

Scrub caps

Scrub caps work differently from jackets. Our embroidered scrub caps are fixed role and specialty designs, not free-text items: you choose a design such as RN, BSN, OR Nurse, Surgical Technologist, Critical Care, Dental Assistant, or Veterinary Surgery, then pick a colour. They are described as adjustable fit and machine washable.

Printed scrub caps are the pattern-based route, where each design is its own product. They are a good fit for teams who want personality rather than a role label. Our custom scrub cap ideas guide covers how to choose between them.

Step 2: Collect names, roles, and credentials

This is the step that most rewards being fussy. Gather the details in writing from each person rather than filling them in on their behalf.

What to ask each person for

For a jacket, you generally need the name exactly as they want it embroidered, the credential or title that should follow it, and the department if you are including one. Ask people to write their own name and credential rather than confirming a version you typed, and be explicit about capitalisation and punctuation, since "RN, BSN" and "RN BSN" are different pieces of embroidery.

Decide as a group whether you are using first names, full names, or a mix. A team where half the jackets say "Maria" and half say "Maria Santos, RN" looks unplanned, even though each individual jacket is fine.

Placement and how much text to include

Jackets support concise text, and concise is genuinely better. A name with a credential reads cleanly from across a unit; a name plus credential plus department plus unit nickname does not. The dry-fit jacket gives you chest, back, and sleeve to work with, so if you need more than one piece of information, spread it out rather than crowding a single spot. Our what-to-embroider guide has worked examples.

Step 3: Confirm what is supported before you promise it

It is worth checking availability before telling the team what they are getting, because jackets and caps support different things.

Credentials belong on jackets

Jacket personalization is free text, so any credential a person actually holds can go on a jacket. Scrub caps are the opposite: they exist as a set catalogue of fixed designs, and a role only has a cap if that cap exists. RN and BSN caps exist; several other credentials do not have a cap of their own. If a role on your roster has no matching cap, the jacket is the place for that credential, or you can ask us. Our role and credential guide goes through this in detail.

Check the exact product page, not a general assumption

Size and colour ranges are not identical across every jacket. The main healthcare fleece runs S–4XL in eight colours, while some other fleece styles run S–3XL in a shorter colour list, and the dry-fit jacket runs S–3XL in its own eight-colour range. Before you circulate a size and colour form to the team, open the specific product you intend to order and build the form from what that page actually offers.

Step 4: Collect sizes without guessing

Sizes cause more reorders than anything else on this list, and the fix is simple: let people choose their own.

Ask, never estimate

Send the size list from the product page and have each person pick their own size in writing. Do not size colleagues by eye, and do not carry sizes over from a previous order of a different garment. Jackets are frequently layered over scrubs, so some people deliberately size up for room; that is their call to make, not something to infer.

Remember that scrub caps have no size to collect. Embroidered caps are described as adjustable fit, so for caps you only need a design and a colour, which makes them the simplest line on any team order.

If someone is unsure

For anyone between sizes or ordering a style they have not worn, our size and fit guide walks through how to think about it, and you are welcome to contact us with sizing questions before the order goes in. Since personalized items are made to your specifications, it is much easier to resolve a size question beforehand.

Step 5: Plan colours for the team

Colour is where a team order either looks coordinated or looks like a collection of individual purchases.

Pick one base, or one per group

The cleanest approach is a single jacket colour for the whole team. The next cleanest is one colour per group, so a department reads at a glance. Fleece and dry-fit jackets each come in their own eight-colour range, and darker neutrals like navy, black, charcoal, and grey are the easiest to keep consistent as people join later.

Scrub caps come in a six-colour range, so a team can coordinate caps to jackets without matching them exactly.

Keep the text readable against the fabric

Whatever colour you choose, the embroidery has to read against it. Our colour guide covers contrast and legibility, which matters more on a team order than a single piece, because one poor pairing will stand out next to fifteen good ones.

Step 6: Sort out logos and team names

If your order involves a hospital, clinic, practice, or school mark, handle permission before anything else. Logos belong to whoever owns them, and using one on apparel needs the owner's approval — an internal team order is not automatic permission. Get it in writing from the person who can actually grant it.

The same applies to copyrighted or trademarked symbols and to marks that are not yours to reproduce. An unofficial team name or a department nickname you have invented yourselves is usually the simpler path, and it avoids implying an organisation has endorsed or approved the apparel when it has not.

The dry-fit jacket supports a logo or graphic on the chest or back where you have the rights to use one. If you are unsure whether your artwork will work, send it to us and ask before you order.

Step 7: Review everything before you order

Build in one deliberate review before anyone pays. It costs a few minutes and catches the errors that are expensive to fix afterwards.

The final read-through

Put every line in one list — name, credential, department, size, colour, and product — and check it against what each person actually submitted. Read names character by character rather than skimming them, since a familiar name is the easiest thing in the world to read past. Confirm the credentials match what people hold, and confirm the format is consistent down the whole list.

Have someone who did not build the list check it. A second reader catches things the person who typed it cannot see.

Check your proof

When a proof is provided for personalized work, review it properly against your list rather than glancing at it, and see our order proof page for that step. The proof is your last chance to correct a spelling before an item is made.

Team order examples by setting

The checklist stays the same; what changes is the mix of pieces.

ER, ICU, and surgical teams

Emergency and critical care teams often pair a department fleece jacket with a matching cap where one exists — Critical Care caps exist, for instance. Our ER and ICU apparel guide covers that pairing. For perioperative teams, OR Nurse, RN–Operating Room, Surgical Unit, and Surgical Technologist caps all exist alongside a range of surgical specialty designs; our surgical team apparel guide works through it.

Dental, veterinary, and clinic staff

Dental practices can combine a personalized jacket with a Dental Assistant cap, and veterinary teams can do the same with a Veterinary Surgery cap. Mixed clinic staff, where roles vary widely across a small team, are usually best served by jackets, since free-text personalization covers every role without depending on a matching cap design existing.

Graduation and appreciation orders

Group gifts follow the same checklist with one addition: you are collecting details on behalf of people who may not know about the order. Confirm names, credentials, and sizes through someone who genuinely knows them rather than guessing, and lean toward a role or specialty cap when a size is impossible to confirm discreetly. Our healthcare worker gift guide and team orders guide are both useful here.

When to contact us instead of guessing

Some things are not answerable from a product page, and those are worth asking about rather than assuming. Get in touch if you need a role or credential that does not appear as a ready-made cap design, if you want to use a clinic or practice logo, if you have a sizing question for someone between sizes, if you are planning a larger order and want help organising it, or if you have a question about timing for a specific date. We would rather answer beforehand than have you plan an order around an assumption.

Keeping the finished apparel looking consistent matters too — our care guide covers that, and for anything specific to your items, check the care label or ask us.

What to avoid

A short list of the things that most often go wrong:

Guessed sizes. Sizing a colleague by eye is the single most common cause of a jacket that does not fit. Ask.

Misspelled or inconsistent names. Collect names in writing from the person, and keep one format across the whole team.

Credentials nobody verified. Put on a jacket only what the person actually holds, in the form they use it.

Logos without permission. Hospital, clinic, school, and brand marks need the owner's approval. Copyrighted and trademarked symbols are not usable just because the order is internal.

Too much small text. Crowded embroidery reads poorly at a distance. Keep each line short and use separate placements when you need more than one piece of information.

Inconsistent colours. Decide the palette once, at the start, rather than letting it drift as people add themselves to the list.

Promises about dates. Do not tell a team their apparel will arrive by a specific day unless that has been confirmed. If a date matters, ask first.

Assumed discounts or minimums. Do not build a budget around a bulk discount or an order minimum you have not confirmed with us.

Frequently asked questions

What do I need to collect from each person?

For a jacket: the name exactly as it should be embroidered, the credential or title, the department if you are using one, plus their size and colour choice. For a scrub cap: just the design and the colour, since embroidered caps are adjustable fit and have no size to choose.

Can I put a custom role or name on a scrub cap?

Embroidered scrub caps are fixed role and specialty designs rather than free-text items, so you choose from the designs that exist and pick a colour. If you need a role that is not available as a cap, put it on a jacket or get in touch and we will let you know what is possible.

Do all the jackets come in the same sizes and colours?

No — ranges vary by style. The main healthcare fleece jacket is offered S–4XL, while the dry-fit jacket and some other fleece styles run S–3XL, and each has its own colour range. Always build your team's size and colour form from the specific product page you plan to order.

Is there a minimum order or a bulk discount?

We do not publish an order minimum or bulk pricing, so please contact us with the details of what you are planning and we will tell you what applies to your order rather than have you work from an assumption.

Can we use our clinic's logo on the jackets?

Only with permission from whoever owns it. The dry-fit jacket supports a logo or graphic on the chest or back, so once you have written approval, send us the artwork and we will let you know whether it will work.

How far ahead should we plan for a specific date?

If your order is tied to a graduation, an appreciation week, or another fixed date, ask us about timing before you order rather than working backwards from an assumption. Personalized items are made to your specifications, so it is always worth starting the conversation early.