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Is it really necessary to use a sterile valve for a new patient affected by the same strain of virus. I would expect the hospital to reuse a valve, instead of l
by pauljurczak 7y ago
Is it really necessary to use a sterile valve for a new patient affected by the same strain of virus. I would expect the hospital to reuse a valve, instead of letting a patient die without the ventilator.
- sb8244 7y agoWould there be risk of contamination from other diseases that patients may have? I agree with your general expectation that risky reuse over high-probability death seems strongly preferable. One tricky moral dilemma is what to do if you have 1 clean valve, 1 dirty valve, and 2 patients.
- endtime 7y agoTriage as you would anyway (same prioritization), or flip a coin.
- thaumasiotes 7y ago> One tricky moral dilemma is what to do if you have 1 clean valve, 1 dirty valve, and 2 patients. Why would this be trickier than having 1 clean valve, 0 dirty valves, and 2 patients?
- OJFord 7y agoWell it's exactly the same after you make the choice/use the first valve.
- pauljurczak 7y ago> what to do if you have 1 clean valve, 1 dirty valve, and 2 patients "Just received word from an ICU doctor at a small NY hospital: They are officially out of ventilators and are now double venting patients with COVID (using the same ventilator for 2 infected patients)."
- sb8244 7y agoAbsolutely insane. It's barely started.
- flukus 7y agoI think you'd at least want to sterilize it. Not sure if it's the case with these things, but other devices like endoscopes have enough cracks and crevices for stuff to hide so they have to go through an acid wash instead of steam, so the plastic probably wouldn't survive. Stuff like that either has to be non-corrosive metal or disposable.
- cm2187 7y agoWouldn’t plunging them in a solution with high concentration of alcohol do the trick? (Not a medical professional, asking out of curiosity).
- mattkrause 7y agoThere are much better 'disinfectants': alcohol is good at killing living cells, but doesn't do a great job killing spores or penetrating into protein-rich....gunk. You would probably want to use a "high-level disinfectant" or "sterilant" instead. Gluteraldyhde is fairly common choice or ethylene oxide gas, though both can be fairly nasty if not handled carefully (which is, of course, the whole point).
- ncmncm 7y agoMore emphatically: do not trust alcohol at any concentration to kill pathogens. (Likewise, freezing.) The way alcohol swaps are used, they move contaminants away from the needle insertion site, and the alcohol helps to dislodge them. And, of course, it does kill some kinds of pathogen, as does soap.