Sterile Processing

There is nothing more challenging to effective cleaning than receiving instruments in the decontamination area that have dried blood on them. Reducing this concern has always been an issue.

In the May 2012 print issue of ICT, we explore the dialogue in the sterile processing community that was sparked by a report in the mainstream media on dirty surgical instruments. In actuality, the genesis of the TODAY Show segment and a report from the Center for Public Integrity is rooted in a study in the December 2011 issue of the journal Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology by Pritish Tosh, MD, of the Mayo Clinic Division of Infectious Diseases, and colleagues, who reported on organ/space surgical site infections (SSIs) that occurred after arthroscopic procedures and were due to Pseudomonas aeruginosa of indistinguishable pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) patterns occurring at a Texas hospital from April through May 2009.

Chris Lavanchy, engineering director of the Health Devices Group at ECRI Institute, has extensive experience working with sterile processing departments and provides his insights regarding the imperatives of proper medical device reprocessing.

ICT spoke with Patti Koncur, CRCST, CHMMC, ACE, education coordinator, and Natalie Lind, CRCST, CHL, education director, both of the International Association of Healthcare Central Service Materiel Management (IAHCSMM), about the challenges professionals face when working in the sterile processing (SPD) and central sterile supply (CSSD) departments.