7 Things to Check Before Visiting a Medical Scrubs Shop
Picking a medical scrubs shop shouldn't come down to whichever site loads first on your phone during a break. Scrubs are the one piece of kit you'll wear for 10-, 12-, sometimes 13-hour shifts, on your feet, reaching, bending, running when you need to. The wrong fabric, the wrong size, or the wrong colour for your department can turn a small purchase into a recurring annoyance — or a returns headache.
If you're comparing scrub shops online and trying to work out where to buy medical scrubs you can actually trust, here are seven things worth checking before you order.
1. What the Fabric Is Actually Made Of
Common scrub fabrics and blends
Not all scrubs are cut from the same cloth, literally. Most medical scrubs are made from cotton, polyester, rayon, spandex, or a blend of these fibres, and each brings something different to a long shift.
Cotton is soft and breathable, which makes it comfortable against the skin, but it wrinkles easily and can shrink over repeated washing. Polyester is the opposite: durable, wrinkle-resistant, and able to hold its shape wash after wash, though it's less breathable on its own. That's why the most common fabric on the market is a poly-cotton blend — often somewhere around 65% polyester to 35% cotton — which is designed to combine the comfort of cotton with the resilience of polyester. Add a small percentage of spandex or elastane and you get four-way stretch, which matters if your day involves a lot of bending, crouching, or moving quickly between wards.
ONCALL LONDON builds its scrubs from a mix of cotton, linen, polyester blends, and sustainable materials, aiming for that same balance of comfort, durability and style across its range, including an eco-friendly line made with more sustainable fabrics and production methods.
What to check
The exact fabric composition on the product page, not just marketing terms like "premium" or "performance," which aren't standardised across brands.
2. Sizing, Fit, and Whether the Chart Actually Matches You
Measuring yourself properly
Scrub sizing is notoriously inconsistent between brands. A size that fits perfectly in one range can run noticeably small or large in another, which is why relying on "I usually wear a medium" rarely works when you're buying online.
The measurements that matter most are chest/bust, waist, hip, and inseam, compared directly against the shop's own size chart rather than a generic one. Petite fits are generally built for those under about 5'4", tall fits for those over about 5'7", with shorter or longer inseams and torso lengths adjusted accordingly. If you're between sizes, going up based on your largest measurement (usually hips) tends to give a better result than sizing down.
Women's scrubs uniform and men's scrubs uniform ranges are sized differently, so a shop that gives each its own dedicated chart makes it much easier to get right the first time. The same goes for female medical scrubs and a proper male nurse uniform: fit, cut, and inseam length are built differently for each, and treating them as interchangeable is where most sizing mistakes come from.
What ONCALL LONDON customers say about fit
Worth knowing before you order: customer reviews of ONCALL LONDON scrubs are largely positive on comfort and fit, but a recurring theme — particularly for men's scrubs — is that sizing can run small, with some buyers recommending going up a size, especially on the joggers.
What to check
The specific product's size chart (not a brand-wide average), and recent reviews mentioning true-to-size or run-small/run-large feedback for that exact style.
3. Whether the Colour Meets Your Workplace's Dress Code
Why scrub colour isn't universal
Colour isn't just aesthetic in healthcare — many employers assign scrub colours by role or department, and turning up in the wrong shade can mean being sent to change.
There's no single UK-wide rule here. Historically, individual NHS trusts have set their own colour policies, which is part of why, before a national standardisation effort, NHS England had over 30,000 different uniform styles and more than 50 shades of blue in circulation across 212 trusts, at a procurement cost of around £23 million a year. A national framework has since been introduced to simplify this, but adoption in England is guidance-led rather than mandatory, while Scotland and Wales operate nationally mandated colour systems. In general terms, navy tends to signal nursing or senior clinical roles, green and teal are associated with surgical settings, and lighter blues appear across general ward and outpatient use — but these associations shift from trust to trust.
What to check
Your own employer's current dress code policy before ordering — not a generic "what NHS colours mean" guide — then confirm the shop stocks that exact shade. If your trust requires navy blue scrubs, ONCALL LONDON's navy medical scrubs collection covers both women's navy scrubs and men's navy styles, and its site is organised by men's and women's ranges to narrow this down quickly. Some trusts are specific about the exact tone too, distinguishing between navy blue nursing scrubs and a lighter dark blue scrubs shade, so it's worth double-checking swatches rather than judging colour from a thumbnail image alone. For departments that allow more flexibility, black scrubs for women and men are also worth checking against your dress code before ordering.
4. Whether the Pockets Actually Work for Your Shift
Placement matters more than pocket count
Pocket count looks good in a product photo, but it's placement, depth, and closure that decide whether they're useful on shift. A phone pocket that doesn't sit securely, or a pen pocket you can't reach one-handed, becomes irritating fast — and more pockets isn't automatically better if they get in the way of movement.
This is one area where ONCALL LONDON's design choices are worth flagging directly: its scrubs include zipped pockets and dedicated bleep holders, both aimed at keeping a phone or pager secure rather than loose in a standard pocket during a busy shift — a detail multiple customers specifically call out as useful in practice.
What to check
Whether pockets are secure (zipped or reinforced), positioned somewhere you can actually reach mid-task, and sized for what you actually carry — phone, badge, pen, shears — rather than just counting how many there are.
5. How the Fabric Holds Up to Frequent, Hot Washing
The 60°C wash requirement
Scrubs get washed far more often and at higher temperatures than ordinary clothing, so durability under heat matters more here than it does for a shirt or jeans.
Guidance from the Royal College of Nursing states that uniform fabric needs to be able to withstand water temperatures of at least 60°C, and research from De Montfort University has recommended a 10-minute wash at 60°C, or a shorter wash at 71°C, to effectively reduce microorganisms on the fabric. It's worth noting there's genuine debate in the profession about how much infection risk uniforms actually carry day to day — some infection control specialists argue there's limited hard evidence that uniforms meaningfully spread hospital-acquired infections — but the hot-wash durability requirement stands regardless, simply because scrubs need to survive frequent, high-heat laundering without shrinking, fading, or losing shape.
Customer feedback on ONCALL LONDON's fabric specifically mentions it holding colour and shape through repeated 60°C washes without shrinking — a good sign for anyone washing scrubs at home multiple times a week.
What to check
The manufacturer's stated maximum wash temperature on the care label, and whether reviews mention colour fading or shrinkage after multiple washes — that's a more reliable signal than the product description alone.
6. The Shop's Actual Return and Exchange Policy
Reading the policy before you order
Buying scrubs online almost always means buying without trying them on first, which makes the return policy nearly as important as the product itself.
Policies vary more than you'd expect. Some retailers only offer refunds and require you to reorder separately rather than doing a straight exchange, and won't refund the original postage cost. ONCALL LONDON's policy allows returns provided the item has its original tags attached, is in its original packaging, and shows no visible signs of wear — standard conditions, but worth checking before you unpick a tag or try scrubs on for a full shift. It's also worth knowing that personalised items typically can't be returned or exchanged at all, which matters if you're ordering with an embroidered name or logo.
Customer sentiment on returns is mixed across most scrub retailers, including ONCALL LONDON — plenty of buyers report smooth exchanges, but a number have flagged delays getting a return label or slower-than-expected responses from customer service.
Price vs. value
It's also worth separating price from value here. Plenty of shops advertise cheap medical scrubs, but the lowest price isn't always the best deal once you factor in a difficult returns process or scrubs that need replacing after a few months. A clear, fair returns policy is often a better sign of value than the price tag alone.
What to check
Whether the shop offers exchanges or refunds-only, what condition the item needs to be in, whether postage is refunded, and the typical turnaround time customers report in recent reviews — not just the policy as written.
7. Whether the Shop Covers What You Actually Need
Range breadth beyond one flagship product
A shop that only stocks one or two styles limits you the moment your role, department, or preferences change. It's worth checking whether a retailer covers both men's and women's ranges, multiple colourways for dress code flexibility, and complementary pieces — jackets, joggers, underscrubs — so you're not sourcing separate items from separate sites.
ONCALL LONDON was founded in 2022 by NHS doctor Anish Popat, built specifically around the idea that traditional scrubs weren't fit for the realities of a working shift. That clinical background shows up in the range: men's and women's collections, a navy blue line for trusts with that dress code, joggers and scrub tops designed to move together as matching sets, and options like the Mandarin scrub top — a smart zip-and-button collar style with a more tailored fit and durable stretch fabric — for anyone who wants a slightly sharper look than a standard crew-neck top. The men's side in particular covers both classic sets and joggers, so anyone specifically looking for male medical scrubs rather than a unisex cut has proper options rather than an afterthought range.
What to check
Whether the shop's range actually matches your day-to-day needs — colour options, fit range (including petite/tall if relevant), and any add-ons like jackets or joggers — rather than just judging it on one flagship product. A shop that regularly refreshes its catalogue with new scrubs UK styles is usually a better long-term bet than one selling the same handful of lines it launched with.
The Bottom Line
A good medical scrubs shop isn't just the one with the nicest product photos — it's the one whose fabric will survive your actual laundry routine, whose sizing matches its chart, whose colours match your trust's dress code, and whose return policy won't leave you stuck with the wrong fit. Check the fabric composition, measure yourself against the actual size chart, confirm your workplace colour requirement, look closely at pocket design, check the wash temperature rating, read the returns policy in full, and make sure the range actually covers what you need.
If you're after scrubs designed with a working shift in mind rather than just a uniform requirement, browse ONCALL LONDON's collections — a scrub uniform store covering the navy blue range, men's and women's fits, and the Mandarin scrub top — and check the size guide on each product page before you order.
