The role of chemicals in medical gloves
Challenges and opportunities with chemicals in surgical gloves - meeting customer expectations
Chemicals in surgical gloves get a bad rap, but they are not always the bad guy. What challenges and opportunities drive the future of medical glove development?
Can we create medical gloves without chemicals – and better yet, do we need to?
Allergies, standards and innovation all play significant roles in the development of medical and surgical gloves.
In this podcast
Dr Haydn Williams dives into the particulars of how latex allergies have shaped glove manufacture, how standards help measure various glove properties – including the residual chemicals in gloves – and what this means in practice.
Standards and measures
Dr. Haydn Williams says no, in fact, it makes more sense to be able to apply standardisation to medical gloves to test and report residual chemicals in gloves.
Chemicals yes, accelerators no
Medical gloves without the use of chemical accelerators may be possible, but chemicals are here to stay – and they aren’t the bad guy. They are in the glove for a reason.
Refocus
Preserving the properties of gloves that practitioners – and especially surgeons – need will require that manufacturers focus on the removal of chemicals that might cause allergic reactions, reduce chemicals in the focus on different techniques to reduce chemicals in the final product and keep looking at innovations in manufacture to make gloves from which the accelerators disappears.
Hands & gloves
Hands and gloves hold many of the critical keys to infection prevention, OR efficiency and surgical best practices. Hear more from your peers about OR practice, gloving and other surgical-glove-related topics in the podcast series, Hands & gloves.
Listen to all episodesRelated articles
Read all-
Gloves | 2 min read The dangers of powder in surgical gloves
The dangers of powder in surgical gloves have long been known and well-documented. Eliminating the use of glove powder can help eliminate several adverse health effects that may result from its use, such as postoperative adhesions, granulomas, wound contamination and delayed wound healing 1 2.
-
Gloves | 2 min read Culture of OR safety: Double gloving for effective hand protection
Improving surgical gloving practice
-
Gloves | 1 min read The new generation of (NRL) surgical gloves
Surgical gloves and raw materials – time for re-appraisal?
-
Gloves | 1 min read OR sustainability: A holistic system understanding
How do surgical gloves affect sustainability and the global environment?
-
Gloves | 1 min read Creating a Consensus document for surgical gloving best practice – Part 1
The first part discusses the need to create a Consensus document with recommendations for surgical gloving best practice.
-
Gloves | 1 min read Creating a Consensus document for surgical gloving best practice - Part 2
Part two discusses the role of a Consensus work to overcome the challenges of implementing change.
-
Gloves | 1 min read Balancing practice and theory in the OR
Swedish OR nurses’ preventive interventions to reduce bacterial growth and SSIs, and to increase comfort in patients undergoing surgery
-
Gloves | 2 min read Protocol to practice: Single to double gloving
How to implement a double gloving protocol in practice
-
Gloves | 2 min read Strategies for active OR quality improvement
Using improvement science to drive change in the operating room
-
References
- Palosuo et.al. Latex Medical Gloves: Time for a Reappraisal 2011. https://karger.com/iaa/article-pdf/156/3/234/2962765/000323892.pdf