Sponsored – Nuance Medical
Help your customers identify – and replace – hazardous materials in the physician office
When it comes to handling hazardous materials, physician offices are required by law to follow specific guidelines and standards regulated by the Occupational Safety and Health Agency (OSHA). This helps minimize incidents and protects employees as well as patients.
But physician offices may not have a comprehensive understanding of what qualifies as hazardous materials, or what alternatives exist. With a little research and a keen eye on the physician office space, distributor reps can help.
Defining HAZMAT
HAZMAT is an abbreviation for “hazardous materials.” OSHA and its counterpart agencies at the state level are responsible for developing and enforcing the rules for hazardous materials that pertain to worker health and safety issues.
OSHA’s definition includes any substance or chemical which is a “health hazard” or “physical hazard,” including:
- Chemicals which are carcinogens, toxic agents, irritants, corrosives, sensitizers.
- Agents which act on the hematopoietic system.
- Agents which damage the lungs, skin, eyes, or mucous membranes.
- Chemicals which are combustible, explosive, flammable, oxidizers, pyrophoric, unstable-reactive or water-reactive.
- Chemicals which in the course of normal handling, use, or storage may produce or release dusts, gases, fumes, vapors, mists or smoke which may have any of the previously mentioned characteristics.
It is the manufacturer’s responsibility to determine if a material is hazardous, and therefore must provide a Safety Data Sheet (SDS) to its customers.
Meeting the Hazard Communication Standard
Employees who work with or near chemicals or other hazardous materials are required by law to receive proper training on how to handle a chemical spill or leak.
Information should be communicated to physician medical office staff regarding the proper safety measures for the use, storage, and disposal of all hazardous materials. This is known as the Hazard Communication Standard, or the “employee right-to-know” standard. There are four basic requirements:
- A written plan that meets the requirements of the Hazard Communication Standard (HazCom).
- A list of hazardous chemicals used and/or stored in the medical office; this includes labeling with the identity of the material and an appropriate hazard warning.
- A copy of the Safety Data Sheet (SDS) for each chemical used and/or stored in the medical office.
- Employee information and training prior to working with a hazardous chemical, as well as whenever the hazard changes.
Recognizing potential for exposure
Healthcare providers strive to, “First, do no harm.” To that end, it is important that they limit their patients’ exposure to harmful substances. This can be difficult since a few common, everyday items are, in fact, HAZMATs. These include: disinfectants, sterilants, mercury, and ethyl chloride.
HAZMAT related issues that can arise from the use of and exposure to these materials vary greatly depending on what the substance is, the degree of exposure, and the individual being affected. For example, glutaraldehyde is not a known or probable human carcinogen. However, several disabling health effects have been reported among healthcare workers exposed to glutaraldehyde, including asthma and breathing difficulties, headaches, nausea, rashes, and other symptoms.
In health care settings, mercury may be released from thermometers, blood pressure devices, gastrointestinal and other mercury containing medical products. Mercury spills can expose doctors, nurses, other healthcare workers and patients to elemental mercury. At room temperature significant amounts of liquid elemental mercury transform to a gas, exposing workers or patients in the area to potentially highly toxic levels.
Ethyl chloride is another example of a HAZMAT material that can have even more serious effects. It can cause both short- and long-term health problems that range from mild to severe. For example, the precautions on ethyl chloride state that “Inhalation of ethyl chloride may produce narcotic and general anesthetic effects and may produce deep anesthesia or fatal coma with respiratory or cardiac arrest.” It is also highly flammable.
Ethyl chloride is known as a liver and kidney toxin; long-term exposure may cause liver or kidney damage. It has also been listed on California Prop. 65 as a “chemical known to cause cancer.” since 1990.
Taking immediate action
Fortunately, physician offices can take immediate action on the most hazardous products in their office. Some HAZMAT products can be phased out or replaced with safer products that are now available on the market. For instance, glutaraldehyde can be replaced with ortho-phthalaldehyde (OPA) and a mixture of hydrogen peroxide and peracetic acid. It is also relatively easy to phase out the use of mercury because of the many safe, cost-effective non-mercury alternatives that exist for nearly all uses of mercury in health care.
Ethyl chloride can be replaced with CryoDose TA by Nuance Medical, a safer clinical and therapeutic alternative that is non-HAZMAT, non-flammable, non-toxic, requires no special storage or handling, and is disposed of with normal trash.
By taking a safety-first approach to hazardous exposures in the physician office and choosing alternatives to these products, physician offices offer effective solutions while protecting healthcare workers, patients and the environment.
For more information, visit cryodose.com
Sources:
- www.osha.gov/laws-regs/regulations/standardnumber/1910/1910.1200
- www.osha.gov/laws-regs/regulations/standardnumber/1910/1910.1000TABLEZ1
- www.osha.gov/SLTC/healthcarefacilities/otherhazards.html
- www.cryodose.com/toxicethyl/
- www.cryodose.com/hazmat-resources/
- www.psr.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/hazardous-chemicals-in-health-care.pdf
- www.hercenter.org/hazmat/steril.php
A safer alternative to ethyl chloride
Removing ethyl chloride from the physician office only makes sense if there is a safer alternative available that is also lower in cost. In this case there is an ideal, safer clinical and therapeutic alternative available. CryoDose TA is non-Hazmat, non-flammable, non-toxic and requires no special storage or handling, and is disposed of with normal trash.
An ideal, safer alternative exists.
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How reps help physicians address HAZMAT
Distributor reps can help physician offices with HAZMAT materials in several ways.
First, reps should identify who is responsible for the safety of HAZMAT products in the physician office. Often that can be an office administrator, RN, PA, or, in larger practice groups a safety officer or OSHA director.
That person’s responsibility is to educate employees on how to prevent and respond to risks, to keep accurate documentation of incidents, take steps to prevent risks, react to risks that are unavoidable, and report incidents. In other words, they have a vested interest in the safety of the employees and the patients they serve.
After identifying who is responsible, reps can:
- Ask about their use of HAZMAT products and if they’re aware of safer alternatives.
- Once products have been identified as HAZMAT, the next question becomes, can any of these products be immediately converted to safer alternatives to reduce risk and exposure?
- Ask vendors to disclose whether their products contain carcinogens, persistent bio accumulative toxics, mutagens, asthmagens, or reproductive toxicants. This can alert vendors of a preference for least-toxic materials.
- Educate physician offices on identifying vendors that manufacture safer alternatives to dangerous products and that are concerned about the safety of their products, customers and the environment.