Research at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health site in Morgantown is delving into a new method of disinfecting ambulances and other emergency vehicles that have transported patients during disease epidemics - ultraviolet light.
Steve Martin, a research engineer for NIOSH, is spearheading work that would allow first responders to disinfect vehicles for diseases in a way similar to what many hospitals use around the country. Martin said NIOSH is currently developing three different methods of cleaning emergency vehicles using UV-C light, a method potentially better at reaching germs that are sometimes missed by traditional cleaning methods.
According to Martin, the goal of the project is not to promote the UV light method over other cleaning methods, but to develop a way of quickly and safely disinfecting emergency vehicles in the event of a pandemic or other communicable disease outbreak.
"When we conceived this project, we were looking at it purely from a disease pandemic standpoint, so it would be for when things get really bad. We're in no way saying that what we're doing is ready for primetime to replace more conventional cleaning methods in typical day-to-day operations," he said. "There's a lot of research right now in terminal cleaning of hospital rooms with UV systems, because of the increasing cases of hospital-acquired infections ... and a lot of those studies are finding reasonably good results."
One of the methods NIOSH is exploring could be set up by local emergency services workers using items purchased from the hardware store - Martin said one simple way of creating a UV system is to mount UV lamps to a microphone tripod. This method would require the vehicle to be stationary and likely plugged into an external power source, Martin said. The researchers are also working on creating a system of UV light mounted inside the ambulance, as well as a robot that would rove the vehicle emitting UV light to clean it.
All three methods are still being tested, Martin said.
"We've done a lot of testing with them, just measuring the amount of UV hitting various surfaces," he said. "Now we're in the phase where we're coating small metal coupons with real surrogate microorganisms and distributing those through the ambulance in hard-to-reach areas so that we can measure a real microbial kill. Once that's done, I think we'll be at the point where we've at least proven that the concept works, and then we'll move forward from there."
The UV light system does have couple of drawbacks, Martin said. UV-C light can hurt the eyes, so no one can be inside the back of an ambulance while it is being disinfected, and the UV light cannot penetrate bodily fluids, so things like blood must be thoroughly cleaned up by hand prior to using a UV system.
Ultimately, Martin said he hopes the systems will be "another tool in the toolbox" for first responders.
"The same infections hospitals are dealing with are also problems in ambulances," he said. "You can have patients with [c. difficile] infections, or MRSA infections - types of things you don't want to transmit from one patient to the next, so it could be useful there, as well."
Reach Lydia Nuzum at
lydia.nuzum@wvgazettemail.com,
304-348-5189 or follow
@lydianuzum on Twitter.