A risk analysis of the steam sterilization process can improve patient safety

The steam sterilization process is complex and includes a number of important steps: decontamination, preparation and packaging, sterilization, quality control, sterile storage, and product distribution. The effectiveness of this process cannot be determined by inspection or testing of each product, and because sterility assurance is a probability function, it must be assumed that at some time a failure will occur. Don’t let that happen. You can avoid compromising patient safety if you conduct a risk analysis to identify potential problems and correct them before something goes wrong.