Following established guidelines for cleaning and disinfection of AERs (automated endoscopic reprocessors) is mandatory for the safety of your patients and internal staff. But who makes the guidelines and where do you find them to follow?

It's a great question and an absolute requirement to have the right resources on hand. The great news is there's quite a few different respected entities that are contributing to these recommendations. And while the list below is not exhaustive it should give you a great place to start. Reviewing each of these resources should help you understand the best fit for your office. Obviously each machine has its own characteristics possibly creating some small differences in disinfecting guidelines for each unit. However, the general guidelines we believe you'll find are similar and imperative to research and completely understand.

Obviously if you just bought your AER you will be spending some time researching the best safety practices for your specific unit. But it doesn't end there. There's a number of situations where further research becomes a necessity but one of them is when there is turnover. When you bring somebody new into your practice or organization that will be interfacing with the AER, it's important to bring them up to speed with the best and most recent guidelines for cleaning and disinfection. You also have a responsibility to keep up on the latest guidelines making sure your practice is using the latest safety procedures available.

We hope the resources below will help you with this responsibility. They are listed in alphabetical order. Much of it is common sense, but we can't stress enough the importance of making sure your entire staff is well trained with regards to these guidelines.

American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy
13 Elm Street, P. O. Box 1565, Manchester, MA 09144-1314
TEL: (978) 526-8330
http://www.asge.org/

American Society for Testing and Materials
100 Barr Harbor Drive, West Conshohocken, PA 19428-2959
TEL: (610) 832-9585
http://www.astm.org/

Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, Inc.
1016 - 16th St., NW., 6th floor, Washington, DC 20036-5703
TEL: (202) 296-2742
http://www.apic.org/

Association of Operating Room Nurses
2170 So. Parker Rd., Suite 300, Denver, CO 80231-5711
TEL: (303) 755-6304
http://www.aorn.org/

British Society of Gastroenterology
3 St. Andrews Place, Regents Park, London NW1 4LB, 01144-171-387-3534
BSG@mailbox.u2cc.ac.uk.

Canadian Society of Gastroenterology Nurses & Associates
P.O. Box 366, 36 Adelaide Street East, Toronto, Ontario M5C 2J5
www.webray.com/csgna

http://www.sgna.org/