AHAFO EPA SENSITISES HEALTH FACILITIES ADMINISTRATORS ON MEDICAL WASTE MANAGEMENT
Health
Story by Emmanuel Adu GYAMFI
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the Ahafo region on Thursday, held a day's sensitisation workshop for 60 health facilities administrators in the area on medical waste management at Goaso.
It was attended by officials from both public and private hospitals, maternity homes, Journalists, government agencies, and a section of the general public.
Participants at the workshop were taken through topics including pillars of waste management, using appropriate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE),effective waste management plan and records keeping, workable waste control plan and general benefits of proper waste management.
Dr Jackson Adiyiah Nyantakyi, the Ahafo Regional Director, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), in his remarks, noted that healthcare waste was highly infectious and must be a conduit for the spread of a lot of pathogens and communicable diseases if not well managed.
He indicated that medical waste was classified as Infectious and non - infectious, hazardous and non - hazardous, which required a specialised skilled for its management.
The Regional Director stated that non - infectious healthcare waste includes card boards, plastics, food residue and papers while infectious ones were blood, body fluids, sharp objects and other materials from the laboratory and mortuary.
He emphasised that health facilities managers could manage medical waste in the workplace from the most favoured options namely prevention, minimisation and reuse, to the least ones including recycling, energy recovery and disposal.
" I entreat you to use all the six pillars of waste management process including collection, segregation, packaging, labelling, transportation, and disposal procedures" the Regional Director noted.
Dr Nyantakyi implored waste managers to wear appropriate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), cleaned all spilled contact areas with soap, disinfect with dilute bleach solution, soak up liquids with absorbent pads to control spillage.
He admonished authorities to institute a monitoring plan by daily cleaning and sterilisation of equipment and premise, checking that garbage containers were emptied and washed each morning, and regularly observing septic tanks and wells for leakages.
The Regional Director urged health facilities managers in the Ahafo region to keep records on the quantity of waste generated and their disposals were kept in a book, and signed off accordingly after every disposal.
Dr Nyantakyi emphasised that proper implementation of waste management system in health facilities ensured corporate, ethical and social image of the country saying that "we need an all - hands - on deck approach to make this happen".
He indicated that preparing a workable waste control plan by managers of public and private medical institutions helped to comply with regulatory requirement, and prevent the spread of infectious diseases.
Dr Nyantakyi stressed that adopting best practice procedures in medical waste management would prevent healthcare workers, patients and the various wards from unnecessarily infection.
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