Syringe contamination following intramuscular and subcutaneous injections.

FOR many years it had been customary to give a series of intravenous injections of a drug such as neoarsphenamine with the same syringe, merely rinsing the syringe with antiseptic and distilled water before passing on to the next patient. Largely as a result of investigation of cases of postarsphenamine jaundice it has become recognized in recent years that a syringe which has been used for an intravenous injection may be grossly contaminated; such a syringe must be adequately sterilized before re-use. The same applies to intramuscular injections., Since penicillin has become so widely used it has now become apparent that there is a "postpenicillin jaundice" analogous to postarsphenamine jaundice which is conveyed by means of syringes contaminated during intramuscular injection. Cases of postpenicillin jaundice have been reported by Turner (1945), Howells and Kerr (1946), Laird (1946), and Hughes (1946). Cases of jaundice have been reported . after the intramuscular injection of gold salts for rheumatoid arthritis by Hartfall, Garland and Goldie (1937). Kulcharand Reynolds (1942) reported cases after bismuth injections. , The present paper describes experiments which demonstrate that a syringe which has been used to give an intramuscular or subcutaneous injection is frequently contaminated with blood from the patient; a_simple method by which contamination may be avoided is also described. A preliminary report on this work was published by Hughes (1946).