Helping the needful even after you are gone is such a beautiful thought. Making it possible for us is the developing medical science, which brings new and better solution each day. Experts have come up with an interesting idea that will not only save peoples life, but is green too. The high-tech gadgets and metal implants that go to the grave or crematorium with us will be recycled to save the world.
Recycling high-tech body implants:
The idea of re-using high-tech implants removed from dead people is increasingly becoming accepted around the world. Experts are looking for ways to find lifesaving and lucrative uses for our redundant pacemakers, teeth and hips, in addition to screws, plates and even body fat. Re-using donated pacemakers to help save the poor is already in practice. According to a new scientific study, it is completely safe to re-use heart pacemakers recovered by funeral directors. Other implantables such as artificial hips and dental implants are increasingly being sterilized and re-used for poorer patients around the world. The surgical metal, such as artificial hips, bone implants, rods and screws are also being recycled by melting them are then sold off to scrap-metal brokers. Dentures and bridges that contain precious metals, which are used because they are hypo-allergenic and resist corrosion are being recycled too.
Projects giving a helping hand:
The Michigan University in collaboration with local funeral homes and the charity World Medical Relief, which redistributes surplus medical goods, has launched Project My Heart Your Heart. The programme plans to send more recovered pacemakers to developing nations. In a similar attempt, a small scheme has been introduced in America to donate used pacemakers to Bolivia, Vietnam and Ghana. In America, the devices also go into pets such as dogs and horses. Meanwhile, developing-world nations such as India are launching home-grown schemes where rich patients donate their implants to poor locals.
Britain not ready to adapt but still not out of the game:
Re-using high-tech implants, which is being accepted worldwide is getting a little difficult for Britain to gulp down. Britain is just not in favor of re-using and has barred on the ground of hygiene. Medtronic, a leading maker of pacemakers used in the UK, are against the practice and say it cannot ensure that recycled devices are as safe and reliable as new ones. British authorities have banned sterilizing and re-using artificial hips and dental implants too. Britain believes that re-use of pacemakers would appear to be very high risk, not only from the point of view of infection, but also from the reliability of the device.
Though so much against the practice, the nation is not completely out of the game. The Institute of Cemetery and Crematorium Management has begun recycling surgical metal, such as artificial hips, bone implants, rods and screws. At the end of the crimination the above mentioned result in melted lump of expensive high-grade alloys, which are sold to scrap-metal brokers.
Via: TimesOnline