Idaho Medical Waste Disposal

From Missoula to Twin Falls, MedPro is happy to service the whole state of Idaho. As one of the largest but least densely populated states, Idaho is home to an amazing number of mountains lakes and rivers. Interestingly enough, these 4 million acres of wildlife are one of the only places you can mine star garnets – otherwise they are only found in India.

Idaho isn’t just mountains and trees, though. The Gem State is also home to many innovations and one of a kind places. For instance, the inventor of the television came up with the idea for the TV in his Rigby high school science fair. To me, though, the most interesting fact is that the state capital building is actual heated by a water source that is 3,000 feet under the ground. This water heats 1,500,000 square feet all together, and is the only capital building to be heated by underground water!

When outsiders think of Idaho, they think potatoes, when in reality Idaho only produces just under 1/3^rd of all the potatoes grown in the US. Believe it or not, Idaho’s largest and fastest growing export is actually high tech computer products with 70% of Idaho’s exports being tech related.

Despite the booming technology field Idaho has a major shortage of physicians. The state is currently rank 49 in the United States when it comes to physicians per capita, beating out only Mississippi in a 2014 Association of American Medical Colleges study.

Why Are There So Few Doctors in Idaho?

For one, Idaho is one of the 5 states in the US without a medical school. If you live in Idaho and want to become a doctor, you have to go out of state.

While schools like the University of Utah School of Medicine and the University of Washington School of Medicine have partnered with the state to aid doctors-to-be with tuition costs and housing, Idaho’s first in-state medical school will not open until 2018.

Also, Idaho is not very densely populated. The lack of high population cities brings a lack of large hospitals to serve these cities which in turn leads to a lack of doctors who want to practice in state.

That Being Said…

While there is a shortage of doctors, there are still hospitals, doctor’s offices, dentists, surgeons and other healthcare practices in Idaho. In Boise, there is St. Luke’s Boise Medical Center, in Idaho Falls there is the Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center and in Coeur d’Alene there is the Kootenai Medical Center, just to name a few.

All of these practices have something in common – they generate medical waste.

The Idaho Department of Environmental Quality defines medical waste as “Regulated medical waste, also known as infectious waste and biohazardous waste, is a waste that is known or reasonably expected to contain pathogens. Pathogens are microorganisms (including bacteria, viruses, rickettsia, parasites, prions, and fungi) and other agents that can cause disease in humans or animals.”

This includes, but is not limited to, blood soaked rags, used needles, lancets or other sharp objects that have come into contact with blood, contaminated gloves and more. Now you might be thinking “why can’t I throw most of that in the garbage?”

Well, there is no simple answer to this question, but the main three reasons are:

1. If infectious materials make their way to landfills local wildlife may take it and get sick
2. If there are needles in the regular garbage, sanitation workers may get poked and contract disease
3. If controlled medications are thrown away it may be stolen or get into local water supplies

Now imagine if Idaho’s beautiful landscapes were littered with medical waste, or if the breath taking lakes and rivers had needles washing up on shore like what happened during the 80s in the east coast, which actually lead the first medical waste disposal regulations.

Making sure your waste is properly disposed of not only affects you and your coworkers, but if affects the whole world!

MedPro Disposal takes great pride in ensuring this does not happen with our various disposal services. If you need your medical, biohazardous, pharmaceutical or sharps waste disposed of, give us a call today and save up to 30% on your current medical waste disposal pricing.