Sharpsmart: Reduction in Sharps Injuries, Costs, and CO2 Emissions

Authors:   Dailly, S and Davis-Blues, K

Publication:   You Can Have it All: Prevent Sharps Injuries, Save Money, and Reduce CO2!

Summary: 

What is the article?

This article explores the positive impacts that the Sharpsmart sharps container system had on Winchester & Eastleigh Healthcare NHS Trust, a 400 bed small acute trust, including a reduction in sharps injuries, a reduction in their carbon footprint, and cost and time savings for staff.

What did we learn?

The 400 bed small acute trust experienced the following from utilizing Sharpsmart sharps containers:

• Zero needlestick injuries in 12 months after introducing the Sharpsmart system
• An 18% reduction in needlestick injuries
• An increase in staff satisfaction with sharps container use
• Improvement in the trust’s understanding of segregation
• A 33% reduction in sharps waste
• Overall reduction of 68.6 tons of CO2 emissions in year one

To put this in perspective: if a car produces 127 g/km of CO2 it would have to travel around the world over 13.6 times to produce the same amount of CO2 as the trust has saved in one year!

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