Standard hospital blanket warming cabinets can be utilized for complete moist heat SARS-CoV2 inactivation of contaminated N95 masks for re-use

Abstract Shortages of personal protective equipment for use during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic continue to be an issue among health-care workers globally. Extended and repeated use of N95 filtering facepiece respirators without adequate decontamination is of particular concern. Although several methods...

Descripción completa

Guardado en:
Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Anand Kumar, Samantha B. Kasloff, Todd Cutts, Anders Leung, Naresh Sharma, Gloria Vazquez-Grande, Tracy Drew, Denis Laframboise, Olivero Orofino, Joe Tanelli, Jay Krishnan
Formato: article
Lenguaje:EN
Publicado: Nature Portfolio 2021
Materias:
R
Q
Acceso en línea:https://doaj.org/article/32a7f2dab7f2421a82f4b7363774041b
Etiquetas: Agregar Etiqueta
Sin Etiquetas, Sea el primero en etiquetar este registro!
Descripción
Sumario:Abstract Shortages of personal protective equipment for use during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic continue to be an issue among health-care workers globally. Extended and repeated use of N95 filtering facepiece respirators without adequate decontamination is of particular concern. Although several methods to decontaminate and re-use these masks have been proposed, logistic or practical issues limit adoption of these techniques. In this study, we propose and validate the use of the application of moist heat (70 °C with humidity augmented by an open pan of water) applied by commonly available hospital (blanket) warming cabinets to decontaminate N95 masks. This report shows that a variety of N95 masks can be repeatedly decontaminated of SARS-CoV-2 over 6 h moist heat exposure without compromise of their filtering function as assessed by standard fit and sodium chloride aerosol filtration efficiency testing. This approached can easily adapted to provide point-of-care N95 mask decontamination allowing for increased practical utility of mask recycling in the health care setting.