Sterile processing & infection control blog — page 8

For 17 years Dr. Frank Artress was a cardiac anesthesiologist in Northern California. But at the start of the new millenium he and his wife Susan Gustafson, an educational psychologist and trained counsellor, found themselves at a crossroads and began to experience a shift in how they wanted to spend the second half of their lives.

The spotlight has been firmly placed on single use plastic waste in recent years and from the plastic bag mandate coming to the UK in 2015, to the Starbucks 5p levy on cups starting in London in 2018 it has steadily become expected that all industries do what they can to prevent the scenes of plastic destruction.

We’d really like to find out how you feel about using autoclaves and sterilizers. We’re looking for people who either operate, serve, sell or market autoclaves and sterilization equipment. The results of this survey will provide insights on how autoclaves and sterilizers are used and help us understand your needs and better serve you.

Ask any question about sterilization and autoclaving and one of Tuttnauer's experts will answer. Send your question to [email protected] with the title “Q&A.”

If surgical instruments are not cleared of bio-burden (meaning detectable biological contamination from the previous case), disaster unfolds. If a patient is harmed by exposure to a poorly processed surgical instrument, it gets out in the press; the Joint Commission descends upon the institution and everything shuts down.

We have reached the end of the Sterilization Methods Series where we explored the different ways to kill or remove deadly bacteria, viruses, and harmful pathogens.

The autoclave steam sterilization process relies on monitoring three parameters: time, temperature, and pressure. We use heat to perform sterilization and our carrier is moisture in an exact value. In order to achieve an effective sterilization process, we should have control of each one of the three parameters combined, in order to produce saturated steam.

Laboratories and research facilities simply cannot function without their autoclaves. How else can they properly sterilize all of the instruments, materials, and media to run their experiments and daily tasks?

I just returned from a two-week intensive training that took place in the Mexican resort of Puerto Vallarta and happy to share the experience with you. Tuttnauer training sessions turns our technicians into pros, teaching not only the practical and technical aspects of sterilization but also the theory behind it.