Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Facts About Medical Waste Florida Residents Should Know

By Alba Durham


Healthcare services play a major role in ensuring that health problems are minimized and also prevent any risks to our health. However, the provision of these services leads to the introduction of hazardous wastes in the environment. These are the major causes of injuries and infections to unsuspecting individuals. To ensure individuals benefit from the health centers, the medical waste Florida health facilities generate is taken care of to prevent human contact.

The process of offering healthcare services leads to the creation of a wide range of waste products. These include needles, syringes, soiled dressings, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, diagnostic samples, radioactive substances, medical devices, and blood and body parts. Failure to manage these wastes exposes workers, patients and the larger community to a great risk of injuries, toxic effects and infections. These materials also pollute the environment. To prevent any potential problem, it is important to sort, treat and dispose them in a safe manner

Today, most health care facilities outsource the role of managing their discarded materials to third party companies. These companies specialize in the provision of the services to nursing homes, funeral homes, hospitals, tattoo parlors, dentists and doctor offices among others. These services help them to comply with regulations, eliminate health risk factors and ensure proper management of these wastes.

These wastes are broadly classified into two main groups. Those associated with biological materials tend to be more dangerous and therefore special methods of disposal are needed. Their chances of causing infectious diseases are very high. They mainly include used sharp objects and the numerous cultured human tissues, blood and the biologically cultured stocks and plates. Proper sorting and sterilization is necessary before their disposal.

There is also the category made up of discarded materials that are not hazardous. These are commonly discarded in regular trash bins or any other container provided for this purpose. They mainly include embryo plates, unused plates, gloves and tubes. They can either be recyclable or non-recyclable. To ensure proper handling of these materials laboratories are usually provided with the waste stream chart.

The treated medical wastes can be disposed with general discarded substances in landfills or can be discharged in the sewer system. There are various treatment methods that are used. The common ones are incineration and autoclaves. Incineration takes care of most of the wastes generated by health facilities and involves the controlled burning of these materials. Autoclaves are special chambers that apply heat, pressure or even steam for a given period of time to sterilize the medical equipment.

Proper management of medical waste materials yields a number of benefits. The most of all being the reduction and the control of infections and unexpected injuries. It helps to create an atmosphere filled with safe and clean air. It reduces contamination of underground water and the soil, reduces bad smell in the air among others.

Most of the medical waste Florida health centers generate is usually sorted and treated before any individual comes into contact with them. It is advisable to ensure the waste model selected matches the nature of the materials involved. The stringent regulations coupled with heavy penalties ensure a safe environment for all.




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