By working closely with healthcare professionals (HCPs) and patients, we’re able to figure out the best ways to deliver comfortable, accurate, and above all, safe medical devices that leverage our manufacturing know-how.
It’s important to understand the real challenges faced by those who use our devices, as well as the benefits that our innovative safety-engineered devices provide. We recently had the chance to talk with Paul Lee, Medical Devices Training Manager for NHS Wales, about the importance of bringing safety-engineered medical devices into the workplace, and his team’s experience with them. Thanks to him, we gained insight into what steps hospitals need to follow to introduce our devices—and, most importantly, what positive impact the devices have on daily life for those who use them.
How are these risks identified?
We use a tiered risk assessment process to identify areas of risk, assess the likelihood of coming into contact with blood or blood-contaminated products, check if alternative devices are available, and of course, consider the potential for harm. We review this every year since new safety devices are always becoming available. A safety-engineered device isn’t always the solution to every problem. Many times, we’ve tried, tested, and evaluated safety devices in clinical settings and found some were just too bulky or hard to use. In those cases, the device interferes with a clinician’s handling skills, so we choose to use non-safety devices. Still, we back those choices up with PPE, safe work training, safe disposal procedures, and other precautions we’ve always used. The difference now is staff are more aware and actively seeking out backup systems and support.
What role do safety medical devices play in supporting Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) in the workplace?
As I’ve explained, it’s not just about legal requirements—it’s about doing what’s right. Seatbelts are standard in modern cars as part of the safety system to reduce injuries, harm, and even death. Safety devices should be designed for ease of use, yet not interfere with clinical results. With good design and engineering, that’s possible. Some safety devices are better designed, easier to use, and more cost-effective than others. Like I said, it’s about making it simple for people to do the right thing. Today at our health board, if you pick up an IV cannula, needle, or any injection device, it does the job and reduces or eliminates injury or harm. In fact, we’ve nearly gotten rid of needlestick injuries from IV cannula use by switching exclusively to safety-engineered devices.
At first, my clinical colleagues were nervous about the change—worried about different handling or not being able to adapt. But now, if you ask any of them if they’d go back to regular IV cannula, I’m sure the answer would be no. No one would drive a car today without a seatbelt—why would they? They wouldn’t choose a non-safety cannula that could injure staff, lead to time off for shots, mental health impacts, or make it easier to pass along bloodborne viruses.
Do you feel there is more awareness needed on the importance of using safety medical devices?
Health and safety always need to be emphasized. Our message might reach current staff, but there’s a big turnover in the NHS, with new team members joining, some from other organizations or regions, and we can’t always know what kind of safety training they’ve had, or whether their last employer promoted safe sharps practices—or not at all. So, it’s always a good idea to keep reinforcing the message through training, sharing information via newsletters, updates, policy reviews, and sharing audit results.
What has your journey been like in adopting safety medical devices?
Honestly, it hasn’t been easy. Don’t underestimate the work it takes to get started, but once you do, maintaining that progress is important too. We have a great—if small—team, along with a dedicated group that drives change and helps keep things safe. Our safety sharps catalog gives staff images, manufacturer details, user guides, and the correct part numbers to order. Our procurement team blocks any non-safety orders—they can only go through if there’s a signed, approved risk assessment, reviewed every year, to decide if it’s still suitable or if something new has arrived on the market. So, we have our seatbelt in place.
We’re always checking out new, innovative devices, and reviewing our non-safety devices to see if, and when, we can upgrade users to something safer—when it makes sense to do so.
From my experience, we can’t swap every device for a safety product. Some devices are just too small, or the safety features would make things even harder—which isn’t what the law intends. The real goal is to make it easy for people to do the right thing. We’re always looking, always learning, and always making improvements.