Contaminated Sharps

sure is a smal container we use the 1/2 gallon ones that are latched on the walls in our exam rooms and they have to be exactly 53 inches from the ground and no where near a garbage can.

My favorite - sharps containers! :-)

This may sound dumb but what does "contaminated sharps" mean?

It's a sophisticated way of saying "used needles." :-) Razors too - anything sharp.

Thanks Lynne! I now learned something new today. :-)

i want a clean, unused one to drink out of

was there anything in it

I bet that container is just dripping with AIDs

This container is probably smaller than what most of us are used to now days because (I am assuming) this hospital closed before such safety percautions and standards were enforced . Before the AIDS epidemic medical items such as sharps were generally simply diposed of in regular garbage cans and dumped with the regular garbage and landfills if not incernerated. Gloves, disposable syringes, thermometers etc...were all reused with often times with little more sanitaztion and disenfectant than substandard autoclaving and simple alchoal solution. Before the AIDS epidemic it wasn't even something that was thought about, blood and bodily fluids were just well....that; they were gross but usually harmless. Although it is that practice that in part played a role in the rapid onset of the spread of AIDS. Luckily now the medical world knows better. I do have to say though it is disapointing how careless medical workers can be; I work in a hospital (in the ER) and I believe there are many practices as well as healthcare workers (myself included) that could pay more mind to such safety standards. It is better to be proactive rather than reactive but sometimes you get in a hurry (especially in emergency medicine that is very fast paced and demanding) and you just don't have time to constantly wash your hands and change gloves every few minutes. When a patient comes in bleeding or in cardiac arrest you just react.

look at the lid. the sharps containers now have a lid that would be much more difficult to remove and an opening in the top to put the items in. once it is full then that lid closes and it is red bagged and picked up by a biohazard company for disposal.

The hospital is still open and things have not changed much!!

Again, this container seems so modern, just like the ones we use today. Many details do. It is nothing but the obvious deterioration that says it wasn't used a year ago.

I agree with Krow.

The phone number on the container has area code 0442 - that is Hemel Hempstead. All UK area codes had a 1 inserted between the 0 and th enext number several years ago. Hemel is now 01442.

we now have paper labels on the bins so pretty old