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StickSafe is a hospital tray that has been designed to radically reduce the risk of needle stick injury to medical workers. Needle stick injury is a common and dangerous problem for all users of medical needles. Accidental pricking with contaminated needles can lead to healthcare workers contracting blood-borne diseases such as HIV and hepatitis. Needle stick injury is the second most commonly reported accident in the UK National Health Service (NHS) with around 100,000 cases reported annually. The costs to the NHS have been estimated to be greater than £300 million.
The conventional way to make a needle safe after use is to push it back into its protective plastic sheath. However, many needle stick injuries result from this procedure as it is easy to miss the sheath, resulting in the practice being banned by most NHS trusts. Used needles are currently carried around hospital wards on open trays and taken to sharps bins where they are disposed of while still attached to syringes. The failure to separate needles from syringes has an impact on hospital disposal costs, but the process of separating needles from syringes can gives rise to needle stick injuries.
The StickSafe hospital tray has been designed to allow one handed de-sheathing and subsequent re-sheathing of contaminated needles. It also allows the medical worker to separate a contaminated and sheathed needle from the syringe safely, reducing hospital disposal costs. It is an easy to manufacture, low cost solution to a global problem that is not limited to health workers but affects all needle users, e.g. diabetes sufferers or their carers.
The StickSafe hospital tray was recognised by and received an honourable mention from the International Sharps Injury Prevention Awards 2006. It is currently undergoing further testing and development.
A patent has been filed and we are seeking potential licensees.
