Terminal Flash

[chipmoore]

What do you think about this new term. Terminal Flash is a cycle where the items are in a container, a vac cycle is run, the items inside the container are expected to be wet and the /items/load is for immediate use.

Chip Moore
Rochester, NY
Somewhere in Western MN

[barry govenor]

I would say...slow down...be more specific. Just how much difference is there between a flash cycle and a terminal flash cycle...how long are these "wet" items going to sit (with the possibility of transferring aerosols that have landed on the "water droplets" to the instrument? Need specific details and comparisons plus thoughts on when this use would be necessary---flash sterilization has been acceptable --though somewhat disputed--by many for many years? Is the terminal flash taking its place,...perhaps just a bit faster?? I would want to back away until method of flash and its expected use is thoroughly investigated.

[Kristopher]

This sounds like the process we currently use at our facility. We run a 4 minute prevac cycle on all of our flash sterilizers and we utilize Aesculaps Sterilcontainer 2000 solid bottom containers.
The instruments and basket are placed into a solid bottom Aesculap container, filters are placed in the lid, lid is sealed onto the container bottom and tamper proof locks are attached.
Aesculap has validated the moisture retained after the flash cycle is sterile and that the container can maintain sterility for up to 24 hours in an event-related setting.
We use yellow tamper proof locks, instead of orange, for trays that are flashed to distinguish them from trays that have been fully processed in sterile processing.
This process has worked out amazingly for us because it allows us to use the containers that we already own for the flash sterilization cycle.

[carol1967]

We do the same as Kristopher. Love it.

[barry govenor]

Kris,

Thanks for the clarification.