Earthquake Survival Kits

3 Comments

1. dentalvet
   Posted September 18, 2010 at 4:16 pm | Permalink

   I am a veteran. I also work in a VA dental clinic not the one Missouri. I was a dental assistant in the military and now at the VA. There is a lot to say and I am not even sure where to start. First the finding of the inspection “Dr. Gina Michael, the association chief of staff at the hospital, told the affiliate that some dental technicians broke protocol by hand washing tools before putting them in cleaning machines.” What? This statement does not make any sense to anyone who works in a medical or dental facility. Nor should it make sense to anybody with common sense. Why would hand cleaning something make it unsterile before sterilizing it? Then the CNN anchor interviews the congressman and says the instruments were just hand washed not sterilized. Unfortunately we are getting conflicting reports at our meetings to. At the VA the procedure is such:
   1- Wipe all debris (blood, bone, tissue, and cements) off instruments.
   2- Soak instruments in enzyme solution.
   3- Wash and rinse instruments in cleaning solution.
   4- Put the instruments in a ultrasonic cleaner
   5- Put instruments in medical washing machine.
   6- Wrap instruments or put them into medical bags.
   7- Sterilize in Autoclave.
   On top of that the Autoclave is checked on a daily basis. We run a vacuum test on the first load to make sure it has proper steam pressure. Then on the second load we run a spore test to make sure it is killing all the pathogens. Nothing is 100% but the VA and the Military are the best at infection control and dental sterilization. We get checked by JACO and our own VA inspectors the IG (Inspector General). Now unfortunately I have to tell you that at the private dental office that most receive dental care, more than likely they do not do half the procedures we do. Private dental offices do not get inspected by any agencies, government or civilian. Most do not sterilize their handpieces (drills), they are just hand cleaned. They don’t even throw away the burs that go into the handpieces. The burs are just hand cleaned and used again until they are dull or break. We use a new bur for every patient. In private dental offices the instruments are just wiped down, bagged or wrapped then put into a small table top Autoclave. They more than likely do not run daily tests on their Autoclaves, if any at all. Private dental offices do not have the money, staff and most important the time to follow our sterilization and infection control procedures. Now how many people do you know that contracted anything from going to the dentist? Now how many people do you know contracted food poisoning from a restaurant? You use the same silverware that thousands of other people use and not one time are they sterilized. In my opinion the IG found miniscule things and the leadership at the Missouri VA made a bad decision by sending those letters to vets. Because the chances of the vets contracting something are next to nil and sending those letters just caused panic.

2. smitchl100
   Posted October 26, 2010 at 1:26 pm | Permalink

   goin tomorrow night…..cant fucking wait!!!!!

3. Tracy Burns
   Posted January 20, 2011 at 9:01 pm | Permalink

   Have been meaning to write one of these posts as well talking about what we’ve used. Tea tree oil, Vicks and eucalyptus oil have been great – eucalyptus particularly as you can put it in with washing, smear it on bites and rub it on chests when the kids have a cold. Vicks for colds too. I miss having a vapouriser every time the kids have a cold but the chest rubs hurt. Antibiotics for emergencies are great. For kids just ask your doctor and local pharmacy to give you the powder (you just have to add water when you need it). That way it lasts for ages. If you explain your travelling the pharmacy should be fine with it.Don’t worry too much about stocking up on everything. The pharmacies over here are well stocked and hand things out over the counter. Bandaids though are worth stocking up on – the ones we’ve bought over here fall off after two minutes. Other suggestions – antifungal nappy rash cream or paw paw ointment. Even out of nappies our guys still get sore bottoms over here in the heat. An anti-urinary tract infection powder… just in case. A leave on spot remover for clothes – in Australia they have these sards sticks that you can just rub on clothes and it prevents stains until you get around to washing… which can be days. Zip lock bags! Useful for crayons, creams/medicines that have burst, food… you name it. Small needles & thread for buttons and emergency doll repairs. Tweezers and nail scissors. If there’s a particular deodorant or razor blade you love stock up on it, brands may be different. We’ve found it worthwhile to have two medical bags. One filled with the stuff we hardly ever need and want to keep away from the kids – antibiotics, hard core headache drugs etc. The other with the things we use every second day – bandaids, ointments, panadol etc. Otherwise you’re constantly digging through everythingHappy packing.