Your sterile processing department might be buried in the dark and dank sub-basement, but it soon might get a high-tech makeover that will make it look more like Silicon Valley than a back alley. Some of the advances we'll highlight are still a twinkle in some engineer's eye, but others have already been unveiled in select reprocessing rooms around the globe. Here's a look at what's coming.

1 Visualization technologies: nowhere left to hide

For generations of reprocessing professionals, the best we could do to ensure lumens and cannulas were adequately cleaned was to trust the cleaning process. We encouraged visual inspection, but there were limits. It was impossible to see inside an Andrews suction or the handle on an arthroscopic shaver. In a few years, it will be routine for reprocessing technicians to inspect the internal channels of flexible endoscopes with small-diameter borescopes, ensuring there is no cleaning residue, moisture, brush bristles or damage that could harbor microbes. With tabletop microscopes, we'll be able to examine micro-instruments under the same level of magnification as they use on the sterile field. With these visualization technologies, microbes will have nowhere left to hide.

2 Designed for safety: single-use saviors

As micro-technology continues to make the world around us smaller and smaller, the impact will also be felt in reprocessing space. Many surgical instruments with historical cleaning challenges, such as large-diameter endoscopes, could be replaced with camera-pill technology that would let patients pick up a capsule at their local pharmacy, turn on a recording device and a few hours later retrieve the device to send in for physician review. No reprocessing needed. No 120 manual cleaning steps. No chance of hospital-acquired infection. Much rejoicing from reprocessing technicians who could use that time to focus on other quality issues in their department. It's a win, win, win.

3 Customized surgical trays: Mr. Johnson's Knee Instruments

Another glimmer in the not-so-distant future: patient-specific, customized surgical trays, created from diagnostic patient data gathered before the surgical procedure is scheduled. Instead of bringing in 8 generic loaner trays for a knee replacement with trial sizes from pediatric through bariatric, vendors will be able to condense this down to one, small, compact and customized tray of Mr. Johnson's Knee Instruments. As with the camera-pill technology, these custom trays would arrive at your facility prepackaged and pre-sterilized like a traditional implant, saving valuable time, resources and storage space in the reprocessing department.

Then there's the potential to 3D-print antimicrobial surgical instruments. When scientists added an antimicrobial dye to cellulose acetate, they were able to print instruments with light-activated antimicrobial properties built into them. When they shined fluorescent light on a pair of surgical tweezers they had printed, the tweezers' antimicrobial properties activated and killed bacteria.

4 Next-generation construction planning: see it before you believe it

The days of crowding around an unrolled blueprint in a conference room may also be coming to an end as virtual reality (VR) technology will offer perioperative leaders a "real-life" look at the potential construction of their new reprocessing areas. What will the decontamination room look like with 6 case carts loaded in the corner? How many technicians will be able to comfortably fit in the supply picking area? Architects will be able to hand department leaders a VR headset and walk them through the entire workflow from start to finish with realistic spatial representation to identify the kinds of planning decisions that can be missed in today's 2D world of angles and inches. Instead of imagining contingencies, they can be envisioned, rearranged and envisioned again until all members of the team are satisfied — before a single brick is laid.

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5 Training courtesy of Google glass: putting the "tech" back into technician

The sterile processing department of the future may also have an entirely different on-boarding experience for new reprocessing technicians. With the advent of augmented reality (AR) technologies, labor-intensive orientation periods could be bolstered by a set of AR-preceptor glasses that display instrument names, inspection points and testing requirements directly on the lenses. New hires could simply scan a particular instrument or tray to pull up basic information necessary for safely processing the tray. You could use the Google-glass technology to train technicians on processing equipment, storage locations, packaging methods and even safe handling of the myriad chemicals used in the reprocessing area. AR technology in SPD has far-reaching implications even outside of orientation, to areas such as equipment repair, point-of-use IFU access and priority notifications.

6 An automation destination: robots aren't just for surgery

While some facilities are already adopting automated guided vehicle (AGV) robots for case cart, linen and trash transportation, the future opportunities for additional automation in SPD are huge. Automated sterile storage has been on the market for a number of years now, letting technicians select a tray from the unit dashboard and have the storage carousel bring the tray to the receiving window. Automated case picking, already happening in Europe, will not be far behind it. As instrument storage locations are built into the database and preference cards are linked for next-day surgery schedules, one robotic arm can efficiently load case carts at night to be prepared for your 7 a.m. on-time case starts. Related automation is also being done at the instrument-assembly stage, where visual recognition technology and instrument-tracking systems work in tandem to build instrument stringers without the need of human hands.