Instruments

FDA List of “Greater Risk” Medical Devices and Validated IFUs: Part I The FDA has identified a subset of medical devices that pose a greater likelihood of microbial transmission and...

Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) & the Challenges of Surgical Instrument Reprocessing Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), commonly referred to as the human equivalent of mad cow disease, is caused by rogue, misfolded protein aggregates...

Detecting Bioburden & Biofilm on Surgical Instruments Prior to Sterilization Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicate that over 30,000 patients die annually from surgical infections. Many...

ECRI Institute’s “Top 10 Health Technology Hazards for 2017”: Part 2 In Part I of this series (12/22/17) we introduced ECRI Institute’s Health Devices Group “Top 10 Health Technology Hazards for...

ECRI Institute’s “Top 10 Health Technology Hazards for 2017”: Part 1 ECRI Institute is an independent, nonprofit research organization that researches the best approaches to improving patient care. Since 1971,...

How to Properly Clean Surgical Instruments: Part III The cleaning of surgical instruments is defined as the process of removing foreign material (e.g., bioburden, biofilm) from the instruments and is...

The Importance of Sterile Packaging Systems on Patient Safety In previous blogs we’ve discussed the importance of having clean, sterile, moisture-free instruments for every patient, every time. Achieving this goal...

A Checklist For Purchasing New Surgical Instruments The first step in reducing your patients’ risk of a surgical site infection (SSI) caused by a contaminated surgical instrument begins with an...

Creating &  Maintaining a Sterile Field for Surgical Instruments: Part II In Part I of this blog it was pointed out that creating and maintaining a sterile field for surgical instruments...

Creating and Maintaining a Sterile Field for Surgical Instruments: Part I Creating and maintaining a sterile field for surgical instruments during a case is vital to minimizing the risk of...