Delta Chapter Report

Greetings from the Delta Chapter.

The following are some of our activities. On February 26, we attended the Stryker MDR Open House and Education Evening. Twenty-four members attended the evening. Seven members attended the meeting with the Executive members. Unfortunately, some members were unable to attend because of poor weather conditions. During the Delta Chapter meeting (held between 6-630) portion of the evening, we discussed elections and the protocol for nominations. Members discussed the appropriate procedures if they wanted to nominate someone. The deadline for nominations was extended to March 7. If necessary, elections will be held on March 31.

In May, any changes necessary to the Constitution will take place. This meeting will take place at St. Joe's King St. campus. Education day will be in September. Don' t forget to renew your membership June 1. If there are any changes to your email or address, please notify the Delta Chapter Secretary. Following the meeting, we took tour of the one-year-old Stryker facility. We were welcomed into the open concept office and conference spaces. The building is very people-oriented. It has gym facilities, snack areas and places to take breaks and reset your mind. Departments are close to each other to allow for effective communication and facilitate support for one  another. There are fourteen business units, including management and sales force at the location. No sterilization is done at the facility; sterilization is done at the hospitals.The most interesting part of the presentation was a tour of the state of the art operating rooms and their equally state of the art equipment. We also toured a modern patient room that included a bed with a communication device that allows patients to communicate in different languages with a health care provider. The bed also has the ability to shift patients without the health care provider. This has the potential of preventing a lot of back injuries. The members got some hands-on experience of the new improved Stryker equipment.

Rod Parker did a thorough presentation and covered the following topics: low-temperature sterilization and high-temperature sterilization methodologies and differences and cleaning solutions and their different uses and their validation. Because of new technology, low-temperature sterilization is required; an example of this is the batteries in equipment that cannot be sterilized in high heat. He cautioned looking at the ratios in Enzymatic solutions prior to using them in order to provide the best cleaning. Likewise, less cleaning solution will be used in an automated machine vs manual cleaning. The members had a robust question-and-answer period. We even touched on the coronavirus, and his advice was to keep your hands clean with hand washing or hand sanitizers and most important, KEEP YOU HANDS AWAY FROM YOUR FACE!

 We would like to thank the Stryker team for their time and kindness. They made everyone feel welcome and demonstrated thorough knowledge of the topics. They went over and above in their hospitality as evidenced by the number of people who were available to ensure that the evening was a success.

Respectfully submitted,

Octavio Carvalho
Delta Chapter President