How Can You Safely Dispose of Biomedical Waste?

Thankfully, there are a lot of modern methods you can choose from to properly dispose of medical waste. This isn’t something you can avoid doing, as the handling and final disposal of biomedical waste is bound by law. In this article, we’ll take a look at the possible options a medical facility can choose from, as well as what process should be followed!

What is biomedical waste, and why is its disposal so important?

Biomedical waste is usually defined as any waste that is generated at medical facilities, such as hospitals, Central Sterile Supply Departments, dental and other clinics, pharmacies, dialysis centers, and so on. This also means that the categories of garbage that fall under this description can be fairly broad, including all equipment and tools used by staff to treat patients, as well as other materials and remains such as pathological waste, discarded medicine, and sharps waste.

The importance of medical waste disposal is no dilemma: any tool that has already been used, and any equipment that has been in the close proximity of patients can be considered potentially infectious or hazardous to medical staff, not to mention the environment. This can include the protective equipment worn by doctors and nurses!

What are the steps preceding biomedical waste disposal?

Just because you have a good solution to dispose of medical waste does not mean your work is done. It’s definitely a process to get there! There are usually 3 notable areas you have to pay attention to: segregation, storage, and transportation.

Segregation involves the use of special medical waste containers that are each tailored to different types of biomedical waste, and are color-coded to ensure easier identification when collecting potentially infectious materials. These containers can be:

• blue (pharmaceutical waste: pills and injectables)
• yellow (trace chemotherapy waste: can include gloves and gowns)
• yellow with a radioactive symbol (self-explanatory)
• red (medical sharps waste: needles and surgical tools)
• red with a biohazard symbol (contaminated medical equipment)
• black (hazardous medical waste)

As for storing these containers, they will need to be kept in a secure, closed-off area until they can be disposed of. This is the safest way to prevent safety hazards until a medical waste disposal company picks it up and takes care of the final disposal.

And finally: how should you dispose of biomedical waste?

However, you don’t always have to wait around with a bunch of potentially infectious medical waste at your site until someone takes it off your hands. In fact, most tools and equipment can be sterilized to be re-used again, and only certain materials are considered so hazardous they need to be completely destroyed.

Autoclaves are among the most popular tools for onsite medical equipment sterilization in hospitals and other facilities. They are available in a variety of sizes (small, medium, large) to suit the capacity needs and available space of smaller clinics, who can have the same quality performance without any compromises.

As for onsite biomedical waste disposal, like in the case of sharps, a medical waste shredder is definitely the better-suited method. Some models can also handle steam sterilization alongside the shredding, thus making sure the waste becomes completely sterile, making storage less risky!