I had another blood draw today for my GD test and it made me curious- what happens to the blood after the lab tests it? How is it disposed?
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The blood in the lab I work on is kept in the fridge for however long the stability of the tube it was drawn into (2-4 days) and then tossed into biohazard which goes off to a facility to be autoclaved (heated to kill the biohazardous material)
[Former vet tech here] For the animal hospitals I used to work in (early 2000’s), we just threw out the tubes in the regular trash. Sharps went into sharps containers, but everything else was thrown out, Except in one emergency clinic, the owner liked to autoclave the large syringes.
MY TIME HAS COME.
Human blood (unless there are particularly scary pathogens known to be involved) is rated at a BSL-2 level of biohazard, and there are two general routes by which you can dispose of it.
The first is to sterilize it… dumping leftover blood into bleach and wiping down any blood-contaminated surfaces with a 10% bleach solution is pretty standard. I’ve seen some biosafety training courses allowing for the use of isopropyl alcohol instead, but bleach is safer since it actively destroys pathogenic spores.
The second route is to immobilize the blood into a solid. This requires mixing the blood with a kind of sand-like powder that soaks up the blood and turns it into a solid phase. This is then dumped in a red biohazard bin. These bins are designed such that when closed, they lock and cannot be reopened again.
And let’s not forget the plasticware and other disposables that have been contaminated with blood. Dump these things in a biohazard bin as well. You then call up a special biohazard disposal company to take it away for incineration.
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It goes up in smoke. Literally they usually just burn it along with other medical waste like bandages
We put it right in the garbage!
… Kind of.
Normally, depending on the specimen type, we’ll hold onto it for a few days after testing is complete to make sure everything ran okay, and then we empty out the storage for that day with all the specimens of similar types and testing into biohazard bins where it gets carted away to a facility that can properly dispose of it
I’m a funeral director, and when I embalm at the funeral home the blood just drains into the sewer.
I work at a blood bank where we test thousands of blood samples per day. The tube will be tested, and if it’s positive gets sent off to a confirmatory lab for confirmation testing. If it tests negative for everything we store it in a large refrigerator for 7 days before disposing of them in biohazard bins that are taken by a company to be incinerated.
Worked in hospital lab for 17 years. First of all we keep all samples for a limited number of days. Tubes of blood are kept in a fridge for 7-10 days depending on the color top (additive) in the tube. Urine specimens are kept for 3 days.
We do this because more often then not your doctor will get your blood results and then fax us an order for additional testing. If we can we will pull the tube out and run the additional tests which saves many, many patients more needle pokes.
After the time frame they are dumped into a big biohazard bin like any other bio waste. Right along with microbiology plates and negative blood culture bottles.
hope this helps.
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