Medical Waste Alternatives to Ocean Dumping

At one time, the healthcare industry commonly used ocean dumping as a means to dispose of medical waste. Today, few if any medical facilities use this method. Besides finding options that are safer for the environment, the medical industry, guided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, seeks to reduce risk of infection and contamination and to protect public health. Large medical facilities usually destroy medical waste on site, while smaller ones contract biohazardous waste disposal services.

Incineration

• Most medical facilities today use incinerators to dispose of infectious and other biohazardous materials, including human tissue, hair and disposable sanitary products such as diapers. Besides preventing waste buildup in oceans and landfills, fire destroys germs and prevents anything infectious or potentially dangerous from leaving medical facilities. Most hospitals have strict biohazard protocols, requiring employees to safely contain and transport all human tissue and infectious materials to incineration sites as quickly as possible.

Autoclaves

• Steam plays an important role in recycling and disposal of medical waste. Hypodermic needles, sharp instruments, surgical tools, catheters, vials, petrie dishes and other devices which come into contact with human fluids and tissues need to be sanitized. Autoclaves are oven-like devices that use intense amounts of steam to sterilize objects. Once tools and devices are sterilized, a medical facility will usually seal them in sterile plastic and reuse them. In effect, autoclaves foster recycling.

Sanitary Sewers

• Liquid medical waste cannot be incinerated or steam cleaned. That's why hospitals and laboratories have sanitary sewer lines for treating and disposing of fluids. Technicians pour biohazardous fluids into special processing devices that use chemicals to disinfect liquids. Once treated, the sanitized liquids are then released down sewer lines specially registered with local governments or sewer operators for disposal of medical waste. Sewage lines flow to treatment plants, where the presumably sanitized medical waste is again treated in municipal sewage treatment plants.

Outsourcing

• Unfortunately, not every medical facility and laboratory has the equipment for all forms of sanitary disposal. However, they still have the ethical and legal responsibility to see medical waste disposed of safely using incinerators, autoclaves and sanitary sewers. Facilities without such resources contract medical and biohazardous waste disposal services to collect waste and perform these services off site. Because of the risks associated with longer storage time and transport, facilities that outsource take great care to use special containers and proper handling to prevent leaks, spills or human exposure.