It is a general rule, predicated on safety, that once an item has been placed into a clinical waste container then no attempt should be made to retrieve it.
Even with care, it can be difficult to separate and retrieve individual items, and there is a considerable risk of injury or exposure from other wastes that lurk unseen.
Of course, this makes waste audit especially difficult. Poking around with a stick or grabbers is preferable to using a gloved hand but to do the job properly the waste must first be sterilized and for this the only way is by irradiation, rendering the process expensive and time-consuming and suitable only for research purposes. Routine waste audits therefore are limited to poking around on the uppermost layers of a bag of waste – take care not to rip or tear the bag in the process – and peeking into the neck of a sharps bin.
Retrieval of items from waste containers is something of which we should rarely hear, so it is surprising to hear of a dentist retrieving a tooth from a waste sack and re-implanting it into the patient from whom it was extracted, in error, just 2 hours previously!
“Kim Green, who was in agony from a root canal infection, did not know that her healthy tooth had lain among bloodied tissues, saliva wipes and needles used on other patients.
“Dentist Justin George sewed it back in, left her rotten one in place and suggested she take painkillers until another
appointment was arranged. But that night Mrs Green, 44, could stand the pain no longer and was eventually admitted to hospital for an emergency operation.
“A horrified surgeon removed both teeth and immediately reported Dr George to the local health authority and General Dental Council (GDC). He has now been suspended pending a disciplinary hearing.