Bottles of saline and single use

stevierae · Aug 13, 2004

At my place of work whenever we open a new bottle of irrigating saline for the scrub we discard whatever is left, even if the scrub only uses a little of it. Recently a new member told us we could recap it put it back in the warmer, use it again, and discard it within 24 hours. Is this correct, is there a site somewhere to inform?. Which do you all do?. I would like some research on this if poss. Has anyone done any?

That's not a good idea, and, if a post-op infection was to occur, you can bet that it would come up in deposition, and the circulator would be grilled about why she did something like this when clearly the container said, "FOR SINGLE USE ONLY." AORN standards also prohibit the practice.

That's all that the attorney has to do--blow up that label that says "FOR SINGLE USE ONLY" about 100 times and project it onto a screen for the jury to see. That one post-op infection--even if in fact it WASN'T caused by the reused NS but by poor handwashing on the floors post-op--will cost that hospital far, far more than they saved by reusing bottles of NS to save a buck.

Why risk it? I have worked in ORs where they won't even allow RECAPPING of the bottle in the same room, same case--they are THAT afraid of possible contamination.

We used to donate all opened but unused supplies to 3rd world countries and inner city medical clinics--we can't even due that anymore, due to risk of litigation that might ensue if a patient--even though the risk is negligible-- were to get an infection and get a savvy attorney that would blame it on those recycled supplies.

carcha · Aug 14, 2004

I cannot believe I never thought of the "Single Use Only" Stevierae. Let me go bang my head on the wall until I pass out. How stupid am I .? Thanks.