Muscarella L F
Custom Ultrasonics, Inc, Buckingham, PA 18912, USA.
Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 1996 Mar;17(3):183-7. doi: 10.1086/647272.
Controversy has surrounded the use of liquid chemical germicides to reprocess medical instruments that are damaged by heat sterilization. A review of the literature was performed to assess and compare the efficacy of disinfection and sterilization processes. The results of this review demonstrate that high-level disinfection of thoroughly cleaned endoscopes is not associated with a higher infection rate than is "sterilization". While there may be a theoretical distinction between the highest level of disinfection and sterilization, thorough cleaning eliminates clinical differences between the two. High-level disinfection is quick, effective, inexpensive, and recommended whenever heat sterilization is not feasible. A low-temperature sterilization process should be considered only if it is comparable in cost to disinfection or if it offers demonstrated advantages without damaging the instrument. Neither disinfection nor sterilization is likely to be effective if the instrument is not cleaned thoroughly after use.
对于使用液体化学杀菌剂对因热灭菌而受损的医疗器械进行再处理一直存在争议。我们进行了文献综述，以评估和比较消毒与灭菌过程的效果。该综述结果表明，对彻底清洁的内窥镜进行高水平消毒与“灭菌”相比，感染率并不会更高。虽然最高水平的消毒与灭菌在理论上可能存在区别，但彻底清洁消除了两者之间的临床差异。高水平消毒快速、有效、成本低，并且在热灭菌不可行时是推荐的方法。只有当低温灭菌过程的成本与消毒相当，或者在不损坏器械的情况下具有已证明的优势时，才应考虑采用。如果器械在使用后未彻底清洁，消毒和灭菌都不太可能有效。
