Medscanner

The hand-held medical scanner, colloquially named Medscanner (Sometimes nicknamed `Salt-Shaker' due to its shape), is a small sensor/probe utilized by doctors and or science personnel in the 23rd century.

It is comprised of 4 pieces: A black rubberized grip that houses the device's computer, a small rotating sensor, a clear sensor casing, and a dial at the base of the rotating sensor / casing for selecting scan type.

As it has no visual diagnostics display on the back of the device, the device emits an audio readout, a series of warbling tones. The user must undergo extensive training in order to be able to `read' information from the audio signals, and there is no simple method allowing the layman to do the same.

Its scanning range appears to be 5 meters (15 feet). In the episode Elaan of Troyius, Spock used a medscanner when the science station picked up an energy reading from the bridge: the source being Elaan's necklace of Radan crystals, `common stones' on Elas, which were actually Dilithium. He was standing at his console and she was near the turbolift alcove. He was able to detect the dilithium from that distance.

Similarly, when Leonard McCoy scanned the burns Chekov received after handling an acid-filled flower on the planet of Eden, he also scanned the bush, then the ground from at least 9 feet, proving that the medscanner had a range of at least 3 to 5 meters. He also used it, at close range, to scan the poisonous pear-like fruit that killed the minstrel Adam (Episode The Way To Eden).

Though at times used as a stand-alone device, it was often paired with a tricorder, for close-range focused scans.

Although hand-held medscanners were eventually phased out of use in the 24th century, some doctors or other medical / science still utilize them.