When I used to work in a veterinarian’s office, WAY back when I was in college, I had the oh-so-fun job of taking care of our old needles. Bleah! All used needles and sharps needed to be disposed of properly, regardless of if you’re caring for people or pets. Obviously, when you’re dealing with needles that have been used on humans, you have to worry about bloodborne pathogens that can affect you! When you’re dealing with sharps and needles that have been used on pets, there’s less of a risk, since most animal bloodborne pathogens don’t affect humans, but you still need to be careful.

Each of our exam rooms had a sharps collection container for the techs and vets to dispose of the sharps and needles. You can NOT throw them into the trash! Someone needs to empty that trash, and it would be very easy for them to get stuck by an old needle in doing so. State laws regulate sharps disposal very carefully, and sharps and needles be placed into an approved container - you’ve probably seen these containers mounted on the wall in your doctor’s office. Once the sharps container is picked up, the needle and syringes are destroyed, and then it can be recycled or sent to the landfill. That’s the only way to absolutely be sure that no one will get stuck by a used needle. Once your sharps container is full, you need to request pickup, and only then will it be removed and replaced. Quite the process, eh?

A new Sharps mail back program will be of interest to those of you who currently work in the medical field. Instead of requesting pickup on your sharps container, you can drop your container into the mail. Your sharps container is safe to mail, and comes with a special USPS box, a protective liner, and the price includes shipping and proper disposal of the sharps. The BioMedical Sharps Mail Back System is government approved, and meets all OSHA and DOT requirements.

I’ve got 3 nurses in the family…I need to find out if they know about this!