Patient clinical waste
Some of our patients have medical reasons for keeping a clinical waste sharps bin at home. When that bin gets full, they need to dispose of it, but how they do this depends on the borough in which they live.
One time only
For patients where the need for a sharps bin is a one-off (e.g. someone recently discharged from hospital who needs to use sharps for a temporary period of time) with permission from the Reception Lead, you can accept the waste and dispose of it with the rest of the surgery’s clinical waste. When doing this, you must ensure that the bin is properly shut by the patient. Do NOT attempt to close it yourself, due to the risk of needlestick injury (see pink box below).
Southwark Policy
Patients who regularly need a sharps bin at home can download and print the required form (see grey box below), fill it out and bring it to the surgery. Forms must be signed by a clinician and sent from an NHS email. Therefore, once the surgery receives the form, it should be given to the Pharmacist for completion and then sent to the council via the generic surgery email.
The council will then arrange for the bins to be delivered and collected directly from the patient’s home.
N.B. - Penrose Surgery has a paper version of this form that patients can come into the surgery to fill out and leave with reception to pass on to the Pharmacist.
Lambeth Policy
Patients who need a sharps bin at home more regularly, must request it from the surgery (either by phone or email). Once the request is made, Pharmacists are required to fill out a form (see link to form in yellow box below) on behalf of the patient and the surgery, and then send it to the council, via the surgery’s generic email.
Once the form is received by the council, they will then arrange for bins to be delivered and collected directly from the patient’s home.
Process for filling forms can be found here: Clinical and healthcare waste collection referral form | Lambeth Council
Lewisham Policy
Our surgeries in Lewisham have agreed to receive the bins from the patients into the surgery, so that they can be collected with our other clinical waste.
Processing patient clinical waste in our Lewisham surgeries
When a patient drops a sharps bin into reception, there are a few steps required by reception staff to ensure this is traceable and disposed of correctly.
- You must ensure that the top is properly shut by the patient.
- Log the receipt of the bin in the logbook kept in a folder in reception.
- Once it is properly logged, put the bin together with the other sharps bins in the surgery so that they can all be collected by our waste management company.