Evaluation of absorbent sheet to prevent anticancer drugs contamination spread in urine

Abstract

Medically, anticancer drugs contamination leading to human exposure has become an issue. The urine of patients receiving chemotherapy contains anticancer drugs. If urine containing anticancer drugs is excreted, the anticancer drugs are scattered around the toilet bowl, then adhere to slipper soles and spread. Therefore, we developed an absorbent sheet containing activated carbon that absorbs anticancer drugs and prevents anticancer drug contamination spread. In this article, we report the data on the sheet performance evaluation. In artificial urine solutions, 100 μL (20 drops) of cyclophosphamide (CPA; 2,000 μg/mL), methotrexate (MTX; 6,000 μg/mL), and paclitaxel (PTX; 200 μg/mL) were dropped onto the stainless plate of two commercially available medical sheets (Pitapa SheetⓇ; control product 1 and Absocare sheetⓇ; control product 2) and a newly developed sheet (HD Safe Sheet-Neo, test product). Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) slippers were placed on the sheets for 30 s, and anticancer drugs that adhered to the slippers were quantified. We compared the drug quantities that were transferred to the slippers from different sheets. An average of 31.5%, 38.7%, and 50.5% of each of the dropped anticancer agents (CPA, MTX, and PTX, respectively) adhered to the slipper sole. Compared to that of the control product 2, the average adhesion of CPA and MTX was significantly reduced in the test product containing activated charcoal (224 vs 2 μg, p < .050 and 2,235 vs 19 μg, p < .050). Contrastingly, there was no significant difference in the PTX mean adherence (35 vs 13 μg). Activated carbon adsorbs anticancer drugs in urine. The test product containing activated charcoal reduced the amount of scattered anticancer drugs that adhered to the slippers. The results suggest that the activated carbon sheet may prevent anticancer drugs contamination spread in urine.