For more than 50 years, the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI) has helped healthcare professionals define best practices for employees, equipment and patients. AAMI standards are written through careful debate and consensus. They inform the way we work and are our guideposts for protecting patient safety. Staying up to date on AAMI documents is critical for all Sterile Processing professionals.

In episode 138, host Casey Czarnowski speaks with Horlando Cintron and Damien Berg about AAMI’s latest standards and innovations. They discuss new AAMI working groups, important standards updates, upcoming technical information reports (TIRs), and the impact of these publications on our work. Cintron and Berg also explain the AAMI process, share opportunities for participation and encourage you to get involved.

ABOUT OUR GUESTS

Horlando Cintron, Manager of Peri-Operative Support Services and Central Processing, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

Horlando Cintron, BS, CRCST, CHL, has 27 years of healthcare experience advancing patient safety through infection prevention, education and standards development. He co-chairs AAMI Working Group 40, leading the revision of ANSI/AAMI ST79, and received the AAMI Technical Award for co-chairing the ST58 standard recognized by the FDA. His leadership roles include Director, HSPA Foundation Board (2024–2027) and President, New Jersey Healthcare Central Service Association (2025–2026).

Damien Berg, VP of Strategic Initiatives, HSPA

Damien Berg, BA, BS, CRCST, AAMIF, serves as HSPA’s Vice President of Strategic Initiatives and is an HSPA Past-President (2018–2019). Additionally, he works closely with regulatory bodies and standards-making groups, such as the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI) and the International Standards Organization (ISO). Berg also serves on the Executive Committee for the World Federation For Hospital Sterilisation Sciences (WFHSS).

Earn CE Now

Since 1978, the Mercy Ships organization has served patients in parts of the world where medical resources are difficult to access. In that time, Mercy Ships doctors, nurses and technicians, all volunteers, have performed more than 100,000 surgeries with their fleet of state-of-the-art floating hospitals.

In this meaningful episode, host Jon Wood speaks with Katie Vaughn-Bates, Sterile Processing Educator at the University of Rochester and recipient of the HSPA Foundation’s Mercy Ships Scholarship. Vaughn-Bates shares her account of living and working as a mission volunteer. She provides insight into the application process and discusses the similarities and differences of sterile processing activities on a vessel. (Spoiler alert: The technical work is much the same; the interactions with surgeons and patients are not.) Listen to hear about life aboard the Africa Mercy and learn how you can help bring hope and healing to those in need.

ABOUT OUR GUEST

Earn CE Now

HSPA Chapter Resource Roundup

With more than 50 chapters across the country and around the world, HSPA’s affiliated chapter system is available as a local resource to support our Sterile Processing (SP) professionals, wherever they may be. Active participation in a regional chapter offers relationship building and networking, professional development, vendor interaction and inspiration. But where can our chapters and those who run them find support?

In episode 136, host Casey Czarnowski speaks with Arlene Bush, HSPA President and SPD Educator for Lee Health, and Damien Berg, HSPA’s VP of Strategic Initiatives, about the resources available to support our chapters. Our guests give a chapter status update and discuss the value of the Chapter Resource Guide and HSPA Network. Their conversation includes advice on identifying relevant topics, promoting educational events, and collaborating with industry partners as well as the importance of promptly applying for continuing education (CE) approval. If you aren’t connected with a chapter, visit HSPA Chapters to find one near you.

Arlene Bush

Arlene Bush, CRCST, CIS, CHL, CER, DSMD, CRMST, serves as HSPA President as well as the SPD Educator for Lee Health and Communications Director for the Florida Intercoastal Reprocessing Educators (FIRE) chapter. As a seasoned SP leader and subject matter expert, she shares her extensive knowledge through published articles, speeches and the training of future SP professionals.

Damien Berg

Earn CE Now

The concept of Lean has been around for many years. What started as a manufacturing concept has been embraced by healthcare as an effective system to increase efficiency while maintaining quality in patient care. However, if its goals and mechanics are not properly understood, Lean can be applied ineffectively, causing an erosion in the confidence of those who use the process.

In episode 135, host Casey Czarnowski speaks with John Kimsey of STERIS about properly utilizing Lean concepts in the Sterile Processing (SP) workflow. Kimsey concisely encompasses the five concepts of the Lean workplace philosophy: “People working together and continuously improving to create customer value and meet regulatory requirements without generating waste.” Using this one sentence, Kimsey defines the five elements of Lean, starting with the importance of a culture of “people working together” to implement change. This impactful conversation will inspire healthcare leaders to examine their roles and learn how they can best be motivators of improvement.

ABOUT OUR GUEST

John Kimsey, VP, Processing Optimization and Customer Success, STERIS

John Kimsey is a seasoned healthcare management professional who helps leadership teams and Sterile Processing departments optimize operational performance. Leveraging 10 years of non-healthcare management consulting experience, he joined STERIS in 2001 and began to merge Lean operational approaches with healthcare’s clinical requirements, creating a new vision for Sterile Processing. Kimsey has several published works and speaks at national and international conferences on Sterile Processing topics, such as Lean. He has managed both onsite and offsite reprocessing centers and consulted large and small healthcare customers. At STERIS, he helps customers, industry partners, international teams, and healthcare systems optimize their SPD/CSSD operations for measurable success. Whether solving labor shortages, leadership deficiencies, strategic decisions, or process and quality issues, Kimsey comes with a desire to see people succeed.

ABOUT OUR SPONSOR, STERIS

STERIS’s mission is to help customers create a healthier and safer world by providing innovative products and services around the globe. STERIS Healthcare works with customers in the perioperative environment to elevate patient care in Operating Rooms, Endoscopy Suites and Sterile Processing departments. Through comprehensive solutions in equipment, consumables, devices and services, we help customers solve their biggest challenges, leverage opportunities for future growth, and advance the care of patients every day. With a long-standing history and commitment in the Sterile Processing department, STERIS understands the need for optimal processes, compliance and outcomes has never been so critical. We work hand-in-hand with customers to provide interconnected offerings to support all areas of reprocessing, from sterilization products and technologies, to instrument management and reprocessing services. For more information, visit www.steris.com/healthcare.

Earn CE Now

The quality of our water varies dramatically—by location, season and source—and the presence of impurities can have a significant impact on all aspects of instrument processing. For the safety of our patients, healthcare professionals must be knowledgeable about water types and their uses. As stewards of our facility’s resources, we must understand how water affects our instruments, creating spotting, rusting and staining, and how monitoring water quality prevents wasted money and time.

In episode 134, host Casey Czarnowski speaks with Brian Battani of Xylem about water in the Sterile Processing department (SPD). Battani explains the importance of knowing the quality of your municipal water and how it flows through your facility. He discusses today’s water quality standards and treatment processes—water softening, reverse osmosis (RO) and deionization (DI). Battani also advocates for developing a comprehensive facility-wide water management plan. Listen to learn about the science of water and its essential role in the SPD.

ABOUT OUR GUEST – Brian Battani, Senior Business Development Manager, Xylem

ABOUT OUR SPONSOR – Xylem

Earn CE Now

Like every business, healthcare systems are vulnerable to cyberattack in all of its many forms. For those in healthcare, however, the security of the information we access has special significance. Healthcare systems keep detailed records of patients’ medical diagnoses, test results, payment methods and insurance providers. Information of this nature falling into the wrong hands can have lasting detrimental effects on our facilities and the people we serve. In Sterile Processing, we are primarily concerned with protecting our patients against infection, but we must also be vigilant in safeguarding their protected health information.

In episode 133, host Casey Czarnowski speaks with John Kampas, CEO of EMPIST, an IT services and security company. Kampas reviews current and emerging types of cyberattacks, especially those specific to healthcare. He discusses the dark web and how bad actors (criminals) use AI and deepfake technology. Kampas also describes common gaps in healthcare systems and provides strategies facilities can use to improve their cybersecurity and protect business records and patient privacy.

Our Guest:

Earn CE Now

What we do as a perioperative team matters. Day and night, 365 days a year, we save, heal and improve the wellbeing of our patients. In the Sterile Processing department (SPD), compliance with evidence- and consensus-based standards and guidelines, as well as government regulations, is of crucial importance to our work and patient safety.

In episode 132, host Casey Czarnowski talks with international healthcare expert and renowned speaker Sharon Greene-Golden who has spent her distinguished career asking questions to better understand and improve processes. Greene-Golden describes compliance as working “in accordance with the established guidelines,” and she reviews the policies and procedures, standards and regulations SPDs need to be following. She also outlines recovery strategies for teams that are falling short of compliance and discusses the meaning of surgical conscience. “We have to be willing to evolve and change with time,” asserts Greene-Golden, which is why acquiring new knowledge and keeping up with continuing education is so essential. After all, she says, “Surgery begins and ends in SPD.”

Earn CE Now

All surgical instruments take effort to render clean and sterile, but some instruments by their design are more difficult to clean than others. Narrow channels, long lumens and tight tolerances challenge our decontamination professionals to remove soil and reduce the incidence of bioburden.

In episode 131, host Casey Czarnowski speaks with Noah Roitman and Trevor Hazen of HNM Medical about the dangers and high costs of unclean medical devices. Roitman and Hazen review some of the most challenging instruments and offer strategies for complete cleaning. They also discuss the option of single-use instruments as possible alternatives in the prevention of surgical site infections (SSIs).

Guest Speakers:

As the Founder and CEO of HNM Medical, Noah Roitman has spent over two decades building a globally trusted medical device company dedicated to improving surgical outcomes and elevating the standard of care. His passion lies in designing innovative, single-use surgical technologies that address critical needs in contamination control, reprocessing risk and OR efficiency. Roitman is proud to have helped shift the industry’s perception and adoption of single-use instrumentation across specialties such as neurosurgery, orthopedics and cardiovascular care. HNM Medical now serves hospitals and distributors worldwide with a robust portfolio of high-performance tools that support safer, faster procedures.

Trevor Hazen

Prior to starting his career in healthcare, Trevor Hazen earned his bachelor’s degree in organizational leadership from Bethel University. Like countless others in the Sterile Processing (SP) industry, Hazen did not know what he was getting into when he started as a vendor in 2015. He instantly fell in love with SP and hasn’t looked back! Since that time, Hazen earned his CCSVP and GTS certifications and became a member of HSPA, AORN and AAMI. He has presented hundreds of in-services at local hospitals and surgery centers and partnered with over 20 local chapters of HSPA, educating thousands of SP professionals about best practices, industry trends, leadership and professional development.

Host:

Earn CE Now

Managing loaned instrument sets presents difficulties for even the most organized Sterile Processing departments (SPDs). Hospitals and surgery centers with high procedural volume as well as those performing cutting-edge surgeries may see their loaned tray volume eclipse their regular workload at times!

In episode 130, host Casey Czarnowski speaks with Dave Jagrosse, sterile processing consultant and Past President of the HSPA Board of Directors, about loaned tray management and strategies for working with vendors. Jagrosse carefully reviews the many challenges of configuring loaned sets. He discusses staffing, storage and transportation considerations and references trusted resources that are available to support loaned tray management. This episode delivers essential tips to help SP professionals navigate loaned sets, an inescapable and unpredictable but important part of our workflow.

Guest: Dave Jagrosse, Sterile Processing Consultant

Dave Jagrosse is the President of David Jagrosse Consulting LLC which offers educational presentations, published articles, consultant services, and AAMI-based assessments to SP/CSS/OR/Endoscopy professionals worldwide. Jagrosse is a medical device reprocessing subject matter expert to medical device manufacturers, medical companies, independent practices/surgical centers, and offsite sterile processing centers. He is an expert witness for legal matters within the profession and an expert in SPD design and renovation considerations. Jagrosse has more than 36 years of experience in CSSD/SPD as a technician, supervisor, and manager, is an Adjunct Instructor for Sterile Processing with Medcerts, and a Past President of HSPA.

Earn CE Now

Surgical instruments require consistent care from use, through processing and storage, and back to the procedural area. This care saves healthcare systems money and, more importantly, assures that practitioners have the tools that they need, when they need them, to improve patient outcomes. We know from manufacturers’ instructions for use (IFU) and peer-reviewed research that the care of surgical instruments, both simple and complex, begins at the point of use (POU). But how can Sterile Processing professionals communicate effectively with our procedural partners about POU treatment of instruments?

In episode 129, host Casey Czarnowski talks with Tami Heacock, System Director of Sterile Processing at Lee Health, about POU treatment (not cleaning!) and its importance to our work in patient care. She discusses guidelines and standards that are available for encouraging POU treatment and strategies for talking with procedural partners about its importance.

Earn CE Now