Disposable medical supplies are the result of infection control’s efforts in hospitals and other healthcare establishments to ensure staff and patient safety. Stopping infections and cross-contamination caused by treatment in a hospital or other healthcare unit with the use of disposable items used for testing and treatment is the best answer for safety. Infections pose a serious health risk for patients and medical professionals alike, so the best solution for sterilization is the concept of single-use items. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCP) estimate that there are nearly 100,000 deaths in the United States every year which can be connected to about 1.7 million hospital-associated infections. All in the medical field, doctors, dentists, care givers, EMTs and etc. have been looking for ways to diminish these numbers, and disposable medical supplies are a key element in accomplishing this goal. What else has been in use?
The use of autoclaves; industrial machine parts
Before the widespread availability of disposable medical supplies, health and medical establishments used devices called autoclaves to sterilize their tools every time they get used. Autoclaves are like ovens, or more like kilns, which use intense heat and pressure to sterilize medical tools like scalpels, hemostats, and anything that comes into bodily contact with patients and the doctors who treat them. This type of device has been in use for over a century, and is actually quite effective, and is still in use today. Autoclaves kill germs and sterilize surgical stainless steel tools to a 99.98% efficiency.
However, the autoclaving process isn’t perfect and medical tools as a result, depending on their materials and surfaces and the nature of the contagions may in fact not be sterile after autoclaving. Some parts of medical tools can’t be autoclaved because they would melt. Further, while autoclave sterilization destroys bacteria, viruses and fungi, it’s not quite as effective against prions which cause diseases such as Mad Cow Disease (often misdiagnosed as Alzheimer’s disease), Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease and others. For this reason, there is a need for single-use items – hence, disposable medical supplies.
This is the answer for complete, 100% sterilization, because there are many patients out there with weakened immune systems, and 99.98% sterility just isn’t enough, not when compared to 100% – you just can’t get any better than that. Therefore, single-use items such as facemasks and other things which cannot be autoclaved, and even those that can, such as steel – for example, disposable scalpel blades, are the key for plc electrical contractors absolute sterility. Even syringes and needles fall under this category, and not only in areas of expertise that are strictly medical find these of paramount importance to use. There are also other professions that require medical sterility, such as tattoo parlors for instance. With the advent of disposable medical supplies, the use of them can provide absolute safety of health and eliminate contamination of all sorts.
