Legal and biological safety of legal reprocessing of medicalhospital materials

Abstract

Introduction: Procedures using disposable materials in thehealth area began to be performed, for example in cardiaccatheterization, which has a high prevalence of morbidity andmortality. Objective: To justify and reaffirm the reuse of single-use catheters in surgeries, as it is justified by the economicbenefit gained from replacing the purchase of new materialsby reusing them. Materials and methods: A bibliographic anddocumentary narrative review was carried out using LILACSand NCBI as database, with previously defined filters andselection criteria. Resultados: Decontamination, disinfection,conditioning, sterilization, and quality control tests are criticalstages and, therefore, require training. Each of these stages alsohas characteristic risks, which must be minimized. In order toensure the quality of the catheter reuse process, after the cleaningand sterilization process, techniques beyond microscopicand visual evaluation of the device are required. A diversityof techniques is addressed so that the quality of the process isassured. Although legislation and supervision are divergentaround the world, many countries choose to adopt reprocessingwith economic justification in most cases. The reuse ofhospital devices involves several physico-chemical processes,which must be performed with quality and safety. Conclusion:The need for greater rigor in the norms and guidelines thataddress this practice is clear and urgent, as well as the greaterintensity and rigidity of the responsible inspection agencies.The use of luminol as an indicator of organic contaminantsmay generate a false positive result. Therefore, 3M™ Clean-Trace ™ is the best instrument found in the world market toensure that the material that has been reused is free of organicwaste, and thus fit for use in hospitals.