Guidelines for Sanitizing Equipment After Repairs

Equipment intended to touch human food or body parts must undergo strict sterilization protocols after most repair work, or after any break of the equipment's sanitary seal. Depending on the equipment's components, there are several different guidelines for sanitizing equipment after repairs.

Standard Washing

• Sanitizing begins with a general washing of the equipment using normal cleansers. This first step removes any gross contamination such as oils and dirt and prepares the equipment's surfaces for sterilization. For many pieces of equipment, however, a simple washing is sufficient. This is especially true of large machines that process the raw materials for food and beverages, because the final products themselves will be subject to a sterilization process.

Heat Sterilization

• A combination of heat, pressure and steam is effective at sterilizing equipment. Devices called autoclaves will put intense heat and pressure on items (typically metal objects, with no soft plastic or circuitry) for a minimum of 55 minutes. The combination of heat and pressure kills microorganisms. Autoclaves are common in dental offices, medical offices, tattoo parlors and anywhere that reusable instruments are used in a bio-hazardous environment.

Chemical Sterilization

• Some objects respond better to chemical treatment. Trained workers use concentrated decontamination sprays on objects that cannot undergo heat sterilization or are simply too unwieldy for an autoclave. For example, a hospital bed in a patient's room is sprayed with commercial disinfectants by hospital housekeepers; the spray kills germs on contact.

Radiation Sterilization

• Another option is radiation sterilization. The most well-known application of radiation sterilization is the use of gamma rays to irradiate medical equipment, although irradiation is also used to sterilize some food products directly. The radiation kills microorganisms, either outright or by corrupting their ability to reproduce. Radiation sterilization must be performed by highly trained employees who are certified in the handling of radiological hazardous materials.

Tips

• Check with regulations of the federal Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control regarding what equipment must be sterilized prior to use. This is especially true of equipment used to manufacture food or medicines intended for human consumption, and instruments used to treat or diagnose human patients.