Physicians Fined for Sanitizing Gynecological Equipment Using Dishwasher

Of course, it's important to have sterile hospital equipment, but definitely not the way that three gynecologists decided to "clean" their equipment. According to recent report, three gynecologists from Lewisville Physicians in Salem, VA were fined $1,000 each by the Virginia Board of Medicine after it was discovered that they had used a consumer dishwater to sanitize gynecological equipment.

In response, Lewisville replied that the “physicians felt they were in compliance since they were using a generally accepted practice recommended by their medical residency program and by other medical school experts for disinfecting medical instruments.” The physicians allege that they also scrubbed and sprayed the equipment with medical grade disinfectant.

Some others who have commented on the story argue that consumer dishwashers do reach temperatures high enough to sanitize instruments. Interestingly, it's been mainly men who have deemed it "appropriate" for the Lewisville physicians to use a consumer dishwasher to sanitize equipment that's likely never going anywhere near their nether regions.