Waste management requirements of community i.v. therapy services

Healthcare professionals carry a legal and professional responsibility for the safe disposal of clinical wastes. Sharps safety is paramount, and though this is a well-recognized hazard there remains an unacceptably high incidence of sharps injury and of blood and body fluid exposures that are particularly frequent among ancillary and support staff and waste handlers. Statutory Local Authority waste collection and disposal services generally provide the most convenient and cost-effective approach to community-generated clinical wastes though there remains much room for improvement. Special arrangements will be necessary for the careful collection, packaging and disposal of not only cytotoxic and cytostatic drug wastes, and of items contaminated with these drug substances, and of controlled drugs, but of all other prescription and many non-prescription pharmaceutical products.