Other Machine Operators
This unit group covers Machine Operators not elsewhere classified. It includes Chemical Production Machine Operators, Clay Products Machine Operators, Concrete Products Machine Operators, Crushing Machine Operators, Glass Production Machine Operators, Photographic Print Processors, Sterilisation Technicians and Stone Processing Machine Operators.
A morning in the sterile store
You are a sterilisation technician at a hospital, working in the clean room of the sterile services department on a busy surgical day. It is 7:40am. Theatres are filling, instrument trays are coming back from the first cases, and the washers and sterilisers are running. Decisions made here are never seen by patients, but they depend on them.
Choose what you would do. Then see what happens. There are often good reasons for each choice.
Our next case has been brought forward and we need the knee tray in twenty minutes. I know the cycle takes longer, but can you do something? The surgeon is waiting and the patient is already on the bed.
Run a shorter cycle just this once, since the patient is waiting and the tray looks clean
A tray that looks clean is not necessarily safe. Shortening the cycle means the tray is not properly processed, and you have to tell Farida it cannot go to theatre at all. Time was lost twice.
Tell her the earliest honest time, and ask whether a second tray or a different set could be used in the meantime
Farida finds another tray on the shelf in theatre, and the original comes later when it is ready. Nobody has to cut a corner, and the case goes ahead only slightly late.
Tell her you will do what you can, then send the tray as soon as the machine beeps, without checking the record
It reaches theatre in time, but you have skipped the record that shows what happened to each tray. If a question came up later, there would be no answer.
A returned tray is one instrument short on the count sheet. It is a small one. Theatre says they did not lose it and that you will find it in the wash. Can you just tick it as complete and send it on?
Look in the usual places for a minute, then tick it complete if nothing turns up
A short search is sensible, but ticking the sheet without finding it means the next team believes the tray is whole. It is not, and a surgeon discovers the gap mid case.
Tick the tray complete so the sheet matches what theatre thinks
The record now says something untrue. When the tray is opened in the next case, the missing piece is noticed, and the paperwork points back to you.
Hold the tray, check the washers and bins, and record the missing item for Greg
You find the instrument in a corner of the washer. The tray is made whole, and the record matches. A missing item is a signal to look, not to paper over.
That last load finished its cycle and the machine display says it passed. But the little strip that should have changed colour has hardly moved. I do not want to waste a whole load. Can we release it?
Release it because the display says it passed and the strip is probably just faulty
If the strip is right and the display is wrong, instruments that have not been sterilised go to patients. It is not a risk anyone in the department is allowed to take.
Keep the load back, record what you saw and tell Greg before anything else is done
The load is rerun and the engineer is asked to check the machine. A test that does not agree with the display is the department doing its job.
Keep the load back, but put it to one side without telling anyone what happened
The load is safe, but no one knows why it is sitting there. Someone releases it by mistake at the end of the shift.
How it went
Every tray that left the department was complete and properly processed, and every record told the truth. Machine operators in this group make everything from bricks to glass to chemicals, and some, like sterilisation, work quietly behind the scenes of other people's care. Would you like work where careful routines protect people you will never meet?
This is a simplified, fictional situation to help you explore. It is not professional instruction or a test of your ability.
Case study: The benchtop that did not match the drawing
A fictional case set in the sterile services department of a fictional regional hospital, plus a stone benchtop workshop in the same town.
The situation
Joon ran the stone cutting machine at a workshop that made kitchen benchtops. The template for a job called for a cooktop cut-out in the centre of the slab. While marking the stone, he noticed that the cabinet maker's drawing, attached to the same job sheet, showed the cooktop sitting further to the left. The slab was expensive, there was no spare, and the customer's kitchen was due to be finished at the end of the week.
What they did
Joon put down his pencil and did not cut. He photographed both documents side by side and rang the installer, who had measured the kitchen. The installer confirmed that the cabinet drawing was the newer one. Joon updated his marking, checked the new position with the installer on the phone, and then cut. He also wrote a note on the job sheet saying which drawing he had followed and why.
How it turned out
The cut-out fitted the cabinet exactly. The old template was found to have been made before the design changed, and the workshop began stamping the date on every template. The kitchen was finished on time, and the customer never knew how close the slab had come to being wasted.
What would you do?
- How would you feel about stopping when a mistake would cost a lot and no one else had noticed?
- Why is it better to ask someone who measured the room than to guess which drawing is right?
- What would make you check two documents against each other every time?