Sterilization of Wood-Based Corks…

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Sunday June 1st, 2008 @ 2:12 AM

Filed under: Piercing

I have heard that natural materials, such as cork, cannot be sterilized in an autoclave (I’m assuming under any pressure/temperature). Is this statement true?

The issue with corks is its porous nature and the ability of the steam from the autoclave to get inside the cork and get trapped thus bacteria being able to remain within the cork. As anytime material leaves an autoclave it MUST be bone dry for storage, if its still wet it must be used immediately at that very moment. If its not to be used you must consider it not-sterile and re-package it and re-cycle it until it comes out dry. But that’s the problem because the inner portions of the cork can keep the moisture and with the wood base the cork is made out of, can break down and develop bacteria and other things.

Now that they have Nitrile and Rubber “corks” that are readily available and a lot more denser and do not have the same potential problems as the wooden cork based ones, not to mention they are reasonably affordable as well. Based on that there’s no reason why wooden based corks should still be used.

Personally I don’t use corks anymore but back when I did tey were Nitrile/Rubber based, but I stopped using them because I found them more to be a hinderance then an aid in doing any piercings related procedure.

Posted by Warren Hiller | Permalink | Leave a comment | Trackback