News

Medical Recycling Safer and More Economical

By Katherine Tan

With the recycling trend slowly making its way into metropolises, people are starting to gain awareness of recycling, making every effort to recycle everything they can. In the field of medicine, all things disposable are the gold standard, as they cut down on cross-contamination, despite increasing waste.

However, the Hopkins Medical Institute has been proposing the possibility of reusing and recycling in the world's premier health care center.

"Nobody really thinks of good hospitals as massive waste producers, but they are," said Martin Makary, lead researcher, surgeon and associate professor of public health at the School of Medicine. In fact, medical centers are the second-largest waste producers in the U.S., only surpassed by the food industry.

One of the opposing arguments questions the safety of reusing or recycling medical equipment. Reused and recycled medical equipment creates anxiety among most of the general public. Many fear the risk of transmitting infections, the possible malfunction of already-used devices and the ethical dilemma about the absence of patient consent in using reprocessed devices. Nevertheless, in the March issue of Academic Medicine, Hopkins researchers say that with proper sterilization, recalibration and testing, reuse of such equipment is safe.

"These devices are safe, but it is a public relations challenge. Some people don't like the idea that they're being treated with equipment that has been used before," Makary said. "But these reprocessed devices are as good as new since the testing standards for reuse are impeccable and there have been no patient safety problems in our analysis."

Adding to that, the government has recently mandated all reprocessed equipment to be labeled, along with the name of the company which reprocessed them. Another recent study by the U.S. Government Accountability Office proposed that reprocessed devices do not increase health risks compared to new devices.

In fact, according to the paper, one of the three main factors in advocating the usage of recycled or reusable medical equipment is actually safety. The other two factors are waste reduction and cost-effectiveness.

Many pieces of medical equipment - including laparoscopic ports, surgical gowns and even durable cutting tools - are typically tossed out after a single use. In many operating rooms, some items that are never even used are being tossed away, just because they are single-use, disposable devices that may have been contaminated. Therefore, transforming these items from disposable to reusable and allowing them to undergo resterilization and retesting could possibly decrease the amount of needless waste from hospitals.

Another big reason is that reusing and recycling medical equipment actually saves money, which could prove especially useful in light on the escalating cost of medical treatment. Switching to reprocessed equipment could cost half as much as buying new equipment.

Banner Health in Phoenix saved almost $1.5 million in 12 months, just from reprocessing operating room supplies such as compression sleeves, open but unused devices, pulse oximeters and more.

This idea is not new, but although it has been around since 2002, currently only about a quarter of hospitals in the U.S. use at least one type of reprocessed medical device. While the practice is not yet widespread, the numbers are certainly growing.