COVID-19 Impact to MDRD on How to Reprocess Reusable Medical Devices

By Pablo Ramiro

Infections like COVID-19 have so many unknowns that health officials don’t really know when or if the illness will be eliminated — similar to what happened during the SARS outbreak in 2003. More than a year after the start of the pandemic, with new variants continuing to emerge, people from around the world continue to be affected, from daily activities at home and at work to limited ability to travel.

Reprocessing of reusable medical devices felt the impact of the pandemic along with many other areas of healthcare. As COVID-19 patients continue to seek treatment and fill ICU beds, MDRD staff members are prepared to reprocess reusable medical devices used with COVID-19 patients. All staff members are required to wear PPE to some extent depending on the area (clean or dirty side) in which you are working. Due to the demand for personal protective equipment, especially among those healthcare professionals providing direct patient care, there was a concern of shortage for N95 masks.

Reprocessing of devices intended for single use is not a new concept in MDRD, and a similar process can be done with N95 masks; the difference is the material it’s made out of. Some innovative thoughts were to make your own masks from a piece of cloth; posters on how to make them were posted in public areas. Other companies diverted their manufacturing process to make masks and other equipment, like ventilators. Medical device reprocessing departments were tasked with reprocessing used N95 masks, something they had never done before. Trials were conducted. In this process, infection control relied on MDRD. Used N95 masks were sorted, and if any soil was visible inside or outside of the strap, or ties were broken, the identified mask would not go through the process. Masks that were visibly clean with good straps were packaged and sterilized with a low-temperature H2O2 sterilizer. Once the masks were sterilized, a random check was done: Is the integrity of the mask good? Does the elasticity of the strap do its job? Most importantly, masks were randomly swabbed for laboratory testing. After so many testing processes, the reprocessing of masks was discontinued. Manufacturers were able to meet the demand for masks, and the reprocessed masks were never used.

Beyond N95 masks reprocessing, instruments from the operating room slowed down as most hospitals stopped doing non-critical procedures to free some ICU beds for COVID-19 patients. Some hospitals operating rooms continue to do their regular workload and have accepted other patients from other hospitals; hence, these are added workload for MDRD.

No doubt the COVID-19 pandemic has challenged the medical device reprocessing world as well as the whole healthcare system and every angle of our daily activities. I hope that with vaccine roll-out we will see ourselves back to pre-pandemic normal life.