Expiry dates in surgical equipment: What are the options?

Abstract

Introduction: Hospitals and the healthcare system contribute significantly to global warming, due to the energy use, water use and waste produce going directly to landfill. The operating theatre environment contributes to 70% of all hospital waste, and a proportion of this is due to unused surgical supplies, such as those stocked but never used as they go past their use-by date.

Aim: To evaluate how use-by dates are identified and assigned to surgical equipment, and if there are opportunities to re-use, or re-sterilise this equipment in order to reduce waste from the operating theatre environment.

Results: Use-by dates are assigned to ensure sterility and longevity of the device, and are assigned based on risk analysis, retrospective and prospective assessment. Incineration is the mainstay of disposal of unused medical devices, but there are alternative options such as re-processing in specific circumstances.

Conclusion: A large volume of hospital waste is due to operating theatres, and there is movement towards developing more sustainable methods of dealing with expired surgical equipment. This is however in the early stages, with further research required to confirm if these methods will be safe for patients, and beneficial to the environment.

Keywords: Environment; Expiry date; Sterility; Surgery; Sustainability.