From Dr. William Campbell Douglass, MD:
WARNING: Common camera procedure can kill
The doc will look you right in the eye and claim it's a simple and safe procedure. He'll tell you he's done it dozens of times... maybe HUNDREDS of times... without a hitch.
He'll say all you have to worry about it is getting someone to drive you home, since the anesthesia will make you too groggy to do it yourself.
But if you're about to have an endoscopic procedure -- a tube with a camera that gets shoved down your throat or up where the sun don't shine -- you've got something much bigger to worry about: YOUR LIFE!
Folks around the country have been getting sick and even dropping dead because of dirty endoscopes contaminated with drug-resistant superbug germs.
The feds issued a complicated new set of cleaning guidelines, but I warned earlier this year they wouldn't do a thing to solve the problem.
Now, a new study proves I'm practically psychic -- because researchers say you can follow those new guidelines to a "T" and STILL have enough germs left on the devices to cause a deadly infection.
The study looked at 15 colonoscopes and gastroscopes after each step in the guidelines, including bedside cleaning, manual cleaning in another room, automated cleaning with disinfectant and even overnight storage with isopropyl alcohol and forced air.
Every single one of those treatments left germs on the scope with residual contamination found on high levels of the devices after every step, according to the study in the American Journal of Infection Control.
This shouldn't be a surprise; these steps aren't the safest and most effective. The feds caved to hospitals, which want fast and cheap.
There ARE promising ways to clean these scopes, including EtO sterilization and hydrogen peroxide gas plasma, but hospitals hate them because they take time and money.
But if you're about to get 'scoped, none of that should matter to you. You just want CLEAN.
Fortunately, most of these procedures are scheduled -- which means you can shop around. If you have to get 'scoped, call the hospitals and clinics near you and ask until you find one that uses an effective cleaning method.
Scoping out endoscopes,
William Campbell Douglass II, M.D.
http://douglassreport.com/2015/03/15/endoscope/