Choosing the right steriliser for your practice
Featured Products Promotional FeaturesPosted by: Dental Design 17th November 2024
Choosing sterilisation, disinfection and decontamination methods that effectively prevent and control the spread of pathogens in accordance with HTM 01-05 is an essential responsibility of every practitioner. With exposure to blood, saliva and the oral cavity – a natural habitat for a large number of micro-organisms – the dental setting presents a high number of opportunities for infection.
Dental handpieces can be particularly difficult to sterilise due to the complex internal structures which are considered particularly prone to contamination. To maintain a safe practice and prevent cross-contamination, a dental autoclave is an essential commodity for any busy practice, ensuring all instruments that could present a risk are safe for reuse.
Due to other pressures on the modern dental practice, choosing the right steriliser will increasingly involve other considerations, such as energy consumption, speed and efficiency, and intuitiveness/ease of use. Ideally, any member of the dental team should be able to reprocess handpieces quickly and effectively to meet appointment schedule demands as well as the needs of patients.
Infection control
The main infections that can be contracted in the environment are caused by bacteria, mycobacteria, fungi and viruses and prions – all of which can present a real danger to health.ii Contamination can be bidirectional, during treatment and afterwards, from patient to clinician and vice versa, and can be transmitted by inhalation, injection, ingestion, or absorption through the mucosa or skin.
Potential bloodborne diseases include human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV). Due to gingival bleeding, saliva should be treated with the same caution as blood. Without the proper mitigations in place, pathogens also have the potential to be transferred from patient to patient through shared access to poorly disinfected environments, as well as inadequately decontaminated devices and instruments.
Autoclave types – a summary
The steriliser of choice must be fit for purpose in terms of consistent infection control.
The ‘N’ type autoclave is appropriate for flat, unwrapped, solid medical tools. It is not suitable for sterilising hollow, porous or wrapped loads, but may be useful if your practice has a large number of solid instruments to sterilise.
The ‘S’ type autoclave is considered the intermediate choice between ‘B’ and ‘N’ type options for dental practices, and can be highly useful for sterilising porous, bagged products, although it can’t process textiles. The S class autoclave usually has a range of drying cycle options, and is generally very quick and straightforward to use, but not considered optimal for hollow instruments.
Dental air turbines and straight and contra-angle handpieces can draw in contaminants during their operation. The small parts and long, narrow cavities make these instruments particularly challenging to keep free from infection. Once they have been cleaned and lubricated, the sterilisation process is essential to ensure they are free from infection.
‘B’ type sterilisers are considered the ideal autoclave for managing these instruments. They use a pump to create a vacuum, enabling a high-pressure environment at a temperature too high for microbial survival. The resultant pressure when introducing boiling steam into the vacuum leads to an increase in the boiling point of the water. In addition, the sudden pressure-change creates very hot steam at high speeds, forcing heat through the instrument, penetrating the interior more effectively than other methods.vii
Speed, energy efficiency and the audit trail
Energy efficiency is a vital concern both to save money and to reduce the carbon footprint of the operation. Of equal importance to any busy practice will be the speed and efficiency of the workflow. Sterilisation must also be validated, tested, documented and audited. Sterilisers that integrate these considerations, offering ease of use as well as speedy, effective function, are hugely beneficial for the efficiency of every practice.
Choosing the right autoclave for the practice will also require consideration of the appropriate capacity and size needed for regular use. Do you have limited space, and need a compact design? Or is your operation busy and large enough to warrant a larger unit? Do you need specialised support if things go wrong? If so, is this provided by the manufacturer?
W&H has a range of sterilisers, in compact, large and extra-large sizes to meet the needs of every dental practice. The Lisa steriliser from W&H, for example, provides both ‘S’ and ‘B’ cycles for flexibility, and offers the operator intuitive control for comprehensive and reliable sterilisation. EliTrace automates the vital audit function, meaning every instrument is automatically logged and tracked, so practices know where every instrument is in its decontamination schedule. Eco Dry+ technology also reduces the cycle time, optimising energy consumption for a more cost-effective sterilization process. And ProService from W&H provides additional peace of mind, with total technical support.
Infection control is an important concern for all dental professionals, as procedures are carried out in an environment that exposes staff and patients to significant risk. Choosing a high-quality steriliser represents an opportunity to invest in the safety of your practice, as well as its overall efficiency.
To find out more visit www.wh.com/en_uk, call 01727 874990 or email office.uk@wh.com
Author: Jon Bryant National Sales & Marketing Manager UK & Ireland W&H UK
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