Notes from the field: “A mercury spill–OH NO!”
Several weeks ago I was sitting in a meeting with the CEO of a physician organization. My cell phone was on vibrate, and it kept buzzing across the table. I excused myself and went out in the hall to see where these calls were coming from. All three messages came from the same office. When I called the manager I was notified of a mercury spill. I told her to restrict access to the room and I would be there as soon as I could.
When I arrived, I was told “she’s in there.” After my perplexed “what?” I was informed the employee was sitting in the room with the spilled mercury. The manager had appropriately put a mask on the employee. We immediately had the employee put on a clean pair of scrubs. The clothing was placed in a large trash bag. We replaced her tennis shoes with booties from a PPE kit and had her vacate the room.
Thank goodness this exam room had tile flooring and not carpet!
I put on an impervious gown, gloves, shoe covers, and mask. The source of the spill was a rectal thermometer that had been dropped on the floor. After opening the mercury spill kit, I rolled the mercury beads onto the enclosed trough with the scraper. I placed the beads in a covered container with a dropper. After clearing the room, we closed it off from patients for one hour. One of our local fire departments allows you to drop off the mercury and they do the disposal.
Not all mercury spills are this easy to take care of. I have been in involved in two horror stories that involved knocking off wall-mounted sphygmomanometers. In both instances the spills could not be easily contained. The Regional EPA was called for each spill.
Long story short: Guys arrived in space suits with duck tape on wrists and ankles! (That was what they looked like.) Both facilities were billed thousands of dollars for these mercury spill clean-ups.
Moral to the story: You may want to replace all mercury devices ASAP.
A memorandum of agreement between the EPA and the American Hospital Association sought to virtually eliminate mercury-containing waste from hospital waste streams by the year 2005. The American Academy of Pediatrics has asked all pediatricians to stop using mercury thermometers and encouraged parents to do the same. In some states, you can no longer purchase mercury containing devices.
There is a silver lining to this story. A rectal thermometer now on the market has what looks like mercury in the glass tube. It is a silver fluid called Galinstan. It is a Eutectic mixture of the metal components gallium, indium and tin. There is no appreciable risk to this substance. If you drop this thermometer, the substance does not roll into balls, and it actually smears on the floor. This can be cleaned up with any surfactant/water solution.
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Kathy Rooker
Kathy Rooker is the safety officer and owner of Columbus Healthcare & Safety Consultants, Canal Winchester, OH (krookerchsc@gmail.com or 614-833-9092). Rooker has more than 35 years experience working in the healthcare field and currently provides OSHA and CLIA consulting and inspections for physician practices and conducts OSHA annual training seminars in and around Central Ohio. In her "Notes from the Field" posts, she shares real life OSHA compliance issues and offers solutions to these sometimes complicated situations.
Kathy has written 19 posts.
Comments
Thank you for this article. I have asked about this issue at several training sessions and received different answers from various “experts”. One said that mercury spills should be collected and contained in a spill kit and stored because there was no way to dispose of it safely. That didn’t sound correct so I asked again and was told that spill kits were unneccessary. The specimen should be collected in a leakproof container with a tight fitting lid and stored. Still another person said to use a spill kit and dispose of it with the regulated waste. Non of these recommendations seemed quite right. I have received variations on the procedure over time and am interested to see if there is a written protocol that I could adopt that is based on current guidelines. Luckily I have not needed to use this information I would like to be prepared. Thank you.
Thank you for this article. I have asked about this issue at several training sessions and received different answers from various “experts”. One said that mercury spills should be collected and contained in a spill kit and stored because there was no way to dispose of it safely. That didn’t sound correct so I asked again and was told that spill kits were unneccessary. The specimen should be collected in a leakproof container with a tight fitting lid and stored. Still another person said to use a spill kit and dispose of it with the regulated waste. None of these recommendations seemed quite right. I have received variations on the procedure over time and am interested to see if there is a written protocol that I could adopt that is based on current guidelines. Luckily I have not needed to use this information I would like to be prepared. Thank you.
Denise, I understand your frustration. Using a commercial “mercury spill kit” is the preferred way to clean up this type of spill. Is it the “law”?, no it isn’t. You can try to roll the mercury beads onto a sheet of paper, then use an eye dropper to place the beads into a container with a tight fitting lid. In this emergent situation, it is much easier to grab a “kit” than run around the office looking for the supplies.
As far as the disposal,I recommend that you call the local EPA office in your community or your health department.
I would follow their recommendations, and write your policy from their advice.
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