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The Effectiveness of a Program to Reduce the Rate of Flash Sterilization

  • Julia D. Smart, BA
    • ,
  • Stephen M. Belkoff, PhD, MPH
    • ,
  • Simon C. Mears, MD, PhD

      Affiliations

    • Corresponding Author InformationReprint requests: Simon C. Mears, MD, PhD, c/o Elaine P. Henze, BJ, ELS, Medical Editor and Director, Editorial Services, Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, 4940 Eastern Ave, number A665, Baltimore, MD.

Received 1 June 2011; accepted 24 October 2011. published online 19 December 2011.
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Abstract 

Flash sterilization of surgical instruments has been a common practice, but patient safety and quality assurance health care groups have recently recommended minimizing its use. Our goals were to describe the implementation and effectiveness of our institution's program for reducing the flash sterilization rate of instruments used for total hip and knee arthroplasties. We reviewed flash sterilization logs of all hip and knee arthroplasties from the program's implementation in July 2009 through August 2010 (N = 555) and calculated the monthly percentage of cases using flash sterilization. From the first to the last month, the amount of flash sterilization decreased significantly (P < .05): 6 of 34 to 0 of 41, respectively. Our results show that the rate of flash sterilization can be reduced with this strategic program.

Keywords: sterilization, infection control, hip arthroplasty, knee arthroplasty

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 The Conflict of Interest Statement associated with this article can be found at doi:10.1016/j.arth.2011.10.028.

PII: S0883-5403(11)00577-8

doi:10.1016/j.arth.2011.10.028

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