The Central Sterilising Club (CSC) is holding its Annual Scientific Meeting (ASM) within the historic city of Chester on 14-15 April 2025. The theme for this year's ASM is 'Risk and Revolution,' and considers whether improvements we have traditionally made, need to be revolutionised.
As always, the committee has looked to put a multi-disciplinary programme together to provoke discussion, learning and raise awareness. Opening the proceedings this year will be the eponymous Kelsey Lecture. Established in 1980 through a donation generously provided by Dr. Jos Kelsey, the bequest enables a guest lecturer of international reputation to be invited to speak at the CSC Conference annually.
This year's Kelsey Lecturer is Sulisti Holmes, who brings a wealth of practical experience to our event. Her role within NHS Assure (Scotland) means she is well respected, not only in the UK, but also across Europe and many areas around the World. Sulisti will be highlighting the importance of a transparent culture, escalating, and reporting medical device incidents to ensure a 'lesson learnt' culture.
The programme will also investigate theatre culture and behaviour and will debate the question: are we wasting time decontaminating devices to a high standard, when theatres may not share the same level of diligence? The event will have one session dedicated to such an area and look at how important ventilation services are to ensure contamination rates are minimised within such an environment.
Manual cleaning of flexible endoscopes has always been an area for variability. The speakers will consider: are there systems on the market today to provide greater assurance? Are these systems going to revolutionise the decontamination life cycle used for flexible endoscopes? What is the evidence? What obstacles are in place to prevent such systems being incorporated?
Finally, Day 1 concludes by looking at the revisions currently being negotiated for the revised Medical Device Regulations; where does this leave us as healthcare providers and Decontamination Service Centres? Does this present an issue to the clinical teams working within urgent care centres? What are the perceived risks? Delegates will hear a clinician's viewpoint from the sharp end of surgery.
Day 2 opens with 'Microbiology madness'. Delegates will hear from three of clinicians from within the CSC, giving their opinions as to where the biggest risks are when managing medical devices and controlling infection transmissions. It is traditionally recognised that three such experts will always have their own interpretation of risk, so it should be an engaging session that will educate and enlighten.
There will also be a session on public health concerns, investigating requirements within the cosmetic and body art industry. What are the practicalities that are present? How should we educate the providers and focus on raising standards of decontamination and infection control? The programme will look at the recent legislative work from Wales to raise the profile within the sector, while the event will close with presentations and debate from CSC's Authorised Engineer (Decontamination) members.
The annual debate will discuss the validation regimes currently and historically instigated for equipment used to decontaminate medical devices. The debate will consider: do HTMs promote technological advancement when validating sterilisers/washer disinfectors and other ancillary items used to reprocess reusable devices? Are we wasting resources, or should we be doing more to demonstrate compliance to required specifications? The debate promises to be the usual combination of serious debate and humour, with delegate interaction to ensure audience participation.
The CSC prides itself on being independent and the event will provide education that is based upon the experience of the experts' delivering presentations. To find out more, visit: https://centralsterilisingclub.org
