Medical Device Reprocessing Department (MDRD)

The Medical Device Reprocessing Department (MDRD) recently completed a major overhaul. This essential team cleans and prepares thousands of medical instruments every week.

It’s a little bit like washing the dishes after lunch. You aren’t just going to throw out your best plate and buy a new one – you wash it and get it ready for dinner. Except on a massive scale and the “dishes” are pieces of equipment used to save lives.

Two areas were upgraded in the recent renovations. The main MDRD area on the 1st floor and the surgical scope room on the 3rd floor. Each area received additional equipment and altered floorplans.

Thirty-five scopes were used in surgeries at the hospital during a single day in Febuary. That meant thirty-five scopes needed to be cleaned, sterilized, dried, repackaged and ready for the next round of surgeries. Staff could keep up because the scope room received new equipment and additional workspace. The area now features three upgraded scope reprocessors (it used to only have two older machines), new sinks, new drying cabinets, a pass through window, and is about double in size.

Downstairs on the first floor the team is making use of a third washer, a new cart return and a new dryer. This equipment plus some additional spaces now dedicated exclusively to MDRD mean staff can keep equipment flowing back into busy operating rooms and patient areas.

It likely seems a given that all the equipment used during your next hospital visit is clean and sterile but that doesn’t happen without you the donor and the incredible staff working to clean and prepare each piece of equipment.

Thank you for supporting these high impact but often unseen and underappreciated areas of hospital care that are absolutely essential to keeping quality care close to home.

If you want to read more stories like this check out the latest issue of the Support Report