Lab maintenance tales: Biohazardous Material
"there's no such thing as the dish fairy, your dishes will not magically get clean so make sure you do all of your own dishes" [in type and left above a common area sink for the labs]
"the dish fairy is the work study student" [hand written above the typed note]
I work as a work study student in a fungal pathogen lab. It's a biohazardous risk group 2, means that immunocompromised individuals could risk infection in the lab. So, contrary to popular belief frequently portrayed in Med TV shows, most fungal pathogens cannot make you sick unless you are immunocompromised...i.e. you have a medical condition that has weakened your ability to fight infections (AIDS, Autoimmune disease). I love watching House, but in the episode Season 3 when Foreman nearly dies from a brain parasite, I couldn't believe they were entertaining the diagnosis that his symptoms matched fungal pathogen infection Cryptococcus neoformans before they came to their final conclusion. It's not possible in a healthy, adult man. If their version of the facts were remotely true, I would have died in September after my first day on the job, and so would have everyone else working in the lab. love these sorts of medical dramas, but starting to wish they were much less sensational. waiting for sth really horrible like putative small pox re-emerges and kill off all the characters...hey this happened in ER, minus doctors dying.
You don't have to wear space suits to handle the fungus pathogens, just a regular lab coat and latex gloves. The only thing that would really distinguish working with pathogens in risk group 2 is that you have to discard any cultures with it in an autoclavable bag that has the labels biohazardous risk. Honestly though, the special biohaz risk bags suck, (never buy fisherbrand), regular clear ones are better anyway. Last we heard from the autoclave tech (it's so awesome how we don't have to do the autoclaving, people get hired to just the autoclaving), the biohazardous bags the lab uses exploded...multiple times and he got pissed off cleaning it up. ew. But regardless, if you're working with any biological specimens, harmless plants and algae, you have to kill thoroughly them under high temperatures and pressures in the autoclave and then it goes to some special dumping site. This only applies to solid specimens. If it's in liquid culture, you just pour it down the drain with a little bleach and maybe after autoclaving.
of note, risk group 3 would include SARS. risk 4 would be the Ebola virus. hahahaha. i pray no hobo terrorist reads this. but even if they do, the last two risk groups have security like you wouldn't believe.
"the dish fairy is the work study student" [hand written above the typed note]
I work as a work study student in a fungal pathogen lab. It's a biohazardous risk group 2, means that immunocompromised individuals could risk infection in the lab. So, contrary to popular belief frequently portrayed in Med TV shows, most fungal pathogens cannot make you sick unless you are immunocompromised...i.e. you have a medical condition that has weakened your ability to fight infections (AIDS, Autoimmune disease). I love watching House, but in the episode Season 3 when Foreman nearly dies from a brain parasite, I couldn't believe they were entertaining the diagnosis that his symptoms matched fungal pathogen infection Cryptococcus neoformans before they came to their final conclusion. It's not possible in a healthy, adult man. If their version of the facts were remotely true, I would have died in September after my first day on the job, and so would have everyone else working in the lab. love these sorts of medical dramas, but starting to wish they were much less sensational. waiting for sth really horrible like putative small pox re-emerges and kill off all the characters...hey this happened in ER, minus doctors dying.
You don't have to wear space suits to handle the fungus pathogens, just a regular lab coat and latex gloves. The only thing that would really distinguish working with pathogens in risk group 2 is that you have to discard any cultures with it in an autoclavable bag that has the labels biohazardous risk. Honestly though, the special biohaz risk bags suck, (never buy fisherbrand), regular clear ones are better anyway. Last we heard from the autoclave tech (it's so awesome how we don't have to do the autoclaving, people get hired to just the autoclaving), the biohazardous bags the lab uses exploded...multiple times and he got pissed off cleaning it up. ew. But regardless, if you're working with any biological specimens, harmless plants and algae, you have to kill thoroughly them under high temperatures and pressures in the autoclave and then it goes to some special dumping site. This only applies to solid specimens. If it's in liquid culture, you just pour it down the drain with a little bleach and maybe after autoclaving.
of note, risk group 3 would include SARS. risk 4 would be the Ebola virus. hahahaha. i pray no hobo terrorist reads this. but even if they do, the last two risk groups have security like you wouldn't believe.