Cleaning blood is a task that usually falls on a medical waste management West Palm company and its workers, but sometimes we don’t have the luxury of waiting and have to clean up blood on our own. Whether you are cleaning a crime scene, an operating desk at a trauma scene or after an accident, you want to get rid of blood as fast and as safe as possible.
When it comes to small cuts and other such accidents, cleaning blood is simple, but the more blood pours out of the victim, the more you will have to work to clean it up. And since it can easily get in the carpets, floors and furniture and get soaked up, it can help pathogens spread and grow for years to come.
As per federal and state regulations, blood is considered to be a biohazard and only medical waste management companies can treat scene where there is a need for cleaning blood.
About the Blood-Cleaning Process
Understanding the blood-cleaning process is important, so let’s take a look at some possible situations where knowing how to do this will be helpful to you.
First of all, if you thought that cleaning blood requires only a damp cloth and scrubbing a commercial soap or detergent on the spot, you got it all wrong. Blood cleaning procedure is far more complicated than that.
Medical waste management workers should consider all blood you see on the floor, furniture, carpet or any other surface, as it belonged to an infected person. Even if you know whose blood it is, it is still safer to assume this, as this can easily save your life. Remember this.
So how do you start cleaning blood? Do you first apply a disinfectant or something else? The first thing you want and need to do, actually, is to protect yourself with PPE. Follow OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) Blood-borne Pathogen rules. These guidelines will help you get protected during any blood cleaning and other medical waste management tasks and they include detailed PPE usage and blood cleaning methods you should follow.
The next thing you should do is locate the blood. For example, let’s say that you found blood on the mattress or carpet. Should you simply move the entire thing through the area? Absolutely not. This way, you will only get blood particles all over the place. Sorry, but you will have to cut the area that is soaked with blood and place them inside previously prepared red plastic biohazard bags. Just be careful if you are using a carpet knife that you don’t get cut. This will only increase the chance of infection. Medical waste management workers today use special cutting tools for carpets and mattresses that don’t allow the user to get cut.
In any case, blood cleaning, whether in a home or clinic, can be a difficult task and it poses a great risk to the person’s health. This is why it is important to follow all regulations concerning it, including federal, state, and those of agencies such as OSHA and EPA. Only this way will you make sure that this medical waste management West Palm procedure is done safely.
