The Occupational Health and Safety Administration, or OSHA for short regulates certain types of West Palm Beach medical waste. Knowing OSHA’s regulations is a vital thing when it comes to medical waste removal procedures. The types of medical wastes that are regulated by the OSHA include, among the following, human tissue and blood, needles and other sharps and human pathogen and infectious waste such as diseased organs and biopsy waste. Medical waste removal by health care facilities (hospitals, clinics, nursery homes, dentist offices and other( is observed by federal, state and municipal laws and regulations, as well as government agencies such as OSHA and EPA (Environmental Protection Agency).
In-House Medical Waste Removal or Outsourcing?
For most health care facilities, the biggest medical waste management West Palm Beach dilemma is whether they should do an in-house medical waste removal, or if they should pay an outside professional company handle their waste. There are, of course benefits to both approaches and this really depends on several factors.
In-house medical waste management can be a more cost-effective option in the long run and for larger health care facilities. For example, a large hospital in Miami will likely have its own facilities for disposing of medical waste, such as sanitized landfills, incinerators and other methods of medical waste removal.
Smaller clinics, however, do not have this luxury and must pay a medical waste management company to handle their waste for them. This is not a bad option either and is used by large health care facilities, as well as small. Simply put, many hospitals and clinics simply do not want to bother with medical waste removal and are outsourcing it to professional agencies.
Most commonly, whether you decide on in-house medical waste removal or an outside medical waste management company, medical waste is destroyed using an incinerator machine. This machine uses extremely hot burning furnaces to destroy any solid medical waste and any biological material (microorganisms) in the process. The final produce of incineration is a pile of ash that can be up to 80% smaller in volume from the original waste that was put inside the furnace.
Other medical waste management West Palm Beach techniques can also be used, such as steam sterilization, thermal inactivation, microwaving, chemical disinfection and others, depending if the waste is infectious or not, if it is solid or liquid and other factors.
Where Does OSHA Fit In the Medical Waste Management West Palm Beach Decision?
The role of OSHA in medical waste management is one that cannot be ignored. This organization demands that all medical waste should be disposed in proper bags and containers by health care workers. As such, sharps like needles are disposed in sharps containers and other medical waste in red “biohazard” waste bags. In addition, OSHA also requires regular inspections of medical waste and that reusable containers are decontaminated. However, keep in mind that in many U.S. states, the containers have to be disposed together with the West Palm Beach medical waste in them, and cannot be reused.
