In keeping with guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, personnel at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) re-used N95 respirators to alleviate supply restrictions, utilizing vaporized hydrogen peroxide (VHP)– a common, reliable environmental disinfection agent– as a decontamination technique. In a brand-new study looking at the technique evaluated in between June and August of 2020, physician-scientists at BIDMC reported that a typical type of N95 respirator recycled with VHP maintained its function and efficiency through 25 cycles of re-use. The results appear in the American Journal of Infection Control.
” The findings from our research study expand upon previous findings and show that VHP is a fairly safe technique for reprocessing N95 respirators and might help address shortages in future epidemics,” stated lead author Christina F. Yen, MD, who was a fellow in medicine at BIDMC during the research study and is now at the University of Texas, Southwestern. “It is important that we now find methods to scale and equate this disinfection ability to smaller healthcare facilities and resource-limited health care settings that could benefit just as much– possibly more– from this kind of individual protective devices reprocessing in future disaster scenarios.”
Yen and colleagues conducted a series of qualitative and quantitative tests to examine both the function and effectiveness of 7 N95 respirators that were utilized by three male and 4 female volunteers from June to August of 2020. These tests comprised a user seal check (performed by topics wearing and doffing the respirators), quantitative and qualitative respirator fit testing, and purification effectiveness screening, which evaluates the ability of the respirator to filter out particles.
Even after 25 decontamination cycles, the researchers discovered no changes in respiratory stability or filtration performance among the seven N95 respirators. All 7 N95 respirators satisfied the main endpoints of function and efficiency, passing 25 user seal checks and 8 quantitative and four qualitative fit tests, in addition to preserving filtering performances of 95 percent or above throughout the research study.
Yen and associates noted that successful, massive execution of N95 respirator reprocessing requires preparation and coordination, multidisciplinary teams to make sure disinfection efficacy and end-user security, and considerable logistical assistance.
” In order for recycling to be a realistic choice for healthcare centers, particular actions require to be taken,” stated senior author Preeti Mehrotra, MD, MPH, senior medical director of Infection Control at BIDMC. “Reprocessing can be enabled by creating relationships amongst infection avoidance, occupational health, environmental services, and other relevant departments within medical facilities to facilitate application of appropriate innovations and promoting for the inclusion of individual protective equipment reprocessing in pandemic and epidemic planning.”
Recommendation: “Assessing changes to N95 respirator purification effectiveness, quantitative and qualitative fit, and seal check with repeated vaporized hydrogen peroxide (VHP) decontamination” by Christina F. Yen, MD; Robert Seeley, MS, CSP; Patrick Gordon, DNP, RN, CIC; Lalitha Parameswaran, PhD; Sharon B Wright, MD, MPH; Dana E Pepe, MD, MPH and Preeti Mehrotra, MD, MPH, 5 January 2022, American Journal of Infection Control.DOI: 10.1016/ j.ajic.2021.11.005.
Co-authors included Robert Seeley, MS, CSP, Patrick Gordon, DNP, REGISTERED NURSE, CIC, Sharon B. Wright, MD, MPH, Dana Pepe, MD, MPH of BIDMC; and Lalitha Parameswaran, PhD of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Lincoln Laboratory.
Findings can assist ease supply constraints.
N95 respirators are typically used in health centers worldwide to safeguard health care personnel from transmittable pathogens. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, health care facilities have actually experienced lacks of the respirators, requiring workers to re-use them or resort to less protective masking alternatives.
In keeping with assistance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, personnel at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) re-used N95 respirators to ease supply restraints, employing vaporized hydrogen peroxide (VHP)– a common, efficient environmental disinfection agent– as a decontamination technique. In a new research study taking a look at the technique evaluated between June and August of 2020, physician-scientists at BIDMC reported that a typical kind of N95 respirator recycled with VHP kept its function and effectiveness through 25 cycles of re-use. The results appear in the American Journal of Infection Control.
