Color Coding for Hospital Waste
Color coding is one of the many systems in place within healthcare facilities to reduce the risk of injury, maintain compliance with biomedical waste, and keep medical waste disposal costs low.
What Are The Different Types Of Medical Waste?
The main different types of biomedical waste include biohazardous waste, sharps waste, pathological waste, chemotherapy waste, and hazardous waste.
Importance of Color Coding
Color coding your biomedical waste containers has the following benefits:
- Reduces risk of injury to healthcare staff
- Makes segregation of medical waste easier
- Ensures waste streams are treated properly
- Keeps medical waste disposal costs affordable
What happens to medical waste differs based on the waste stream, and color coding ensures each stream is disposed of properly.
Medical Hazardous Waste Colors
The following is the most common for hazardous waste colors:
Red
Red bins represent biohazardous material. This is one of the main reasons that biohazard waste is referred to red bag waste. This is any medical waste that has been contaminated with blood or other potentially infectious materials.
- Blood and blood products
- Body fluids contaminated with blood
- Sharps waste
- Personal protective equipment (PPE) that came into contact with blood or other potentially infectious materials
Yellow
Yellow containers are for trace amounts of chemotherapy waste. This can be any medical waste that came into contact with chemotherapeutic agents. Yellow bins are lined with a yellow bag and should be clearly labeled as "CHEMO WASTE."
- PPE that came into contract with chemotherapeutic agents
- IV bags or tubing used in the administration of chemotherapy drugs
- Sharps waste involved in chemo treatment
Blue
Blue containers are for non hazardous pharmaceutical waste. This is any prescription or over the counter drug that goes unused. It is a good idea to use a sequestration device which prevents unauthorized access to pharmaceutical waste.
- Pills
- Injectables
- Antibiotics
Black
Black bins represent hazardous waste. Hazardous waste is any waste with the following characteristics: ignitability, corrosivity, reactivity, or toxicity.
- Hazardous pharmaceuticals
- Certain cleaning solvents
- Radioactive waste
It is also important to note that there are proper bins for regular non hazardous waste as well.
Benefits of color coding for medical waste disposal
A great first step to segregate medical waste is setting up a color coding medical waste system within your medical facilities.
Medical waste disposal companies often state that medical facilities are not properly segregating medical waste.
Since regulated medical waste must be sterilized to properly dispose of, medical waste disposal costs more than regular waste management.
To keep costs low, protect the environment from hazardous waste, and stay compliant with local and federal guidelines - proper biomedical waste segregation is a must and color codes are a great starting point.
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