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Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) is crucial in healthcare, helping safeguard care providers and patients from infections, hazardous drugs, bloodborne pathogens and occupational exposures across care settings. Healthcare-associated infections, in particular, can lead to illnesses, antibiotic resistance, and even death. In fact, about 99,000 people die each year from healthcare-associated infections in American hospitals, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Such infections can increase hospital stays by 12 days for patients with one infection and up to 25 days for patients with multiple infections, based on a journal article published on the National Library of Medicine website.  

Within the healthcare industry, PPE is a broad category of commonly used garments such as gloves, masks, gowns and more – all worn by providers when treating their patients. Industry standards, including those set by the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) and the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI), provide critical guidelines to help ensure the safe and effective production, distribution and use of these products.

Cardinal Health offers a wide variety of PPE, including a robust portfolio of exam gloves, facial protection and protective gowns, all tested rigorously and designed to help shield clinicians and patients. We consider comfort, fit and skin sensitivity in the design and development process of these products. Team members in research and development, clinical operations, medical affairs, regulatory and other departments are devoted to the continuous improvements in PPE.

“Our research and development processes are highly customer-focused and differentiated to meet the unique needs and preferences of healthcare providers today and in the future,” said Kelvin Lie, senior manager, research and development for Cardinal Health’s Global Medical Products and Distribution business. “We often engage with clinical experts who help us to deliver quality products to our customers.” 

Delivering innovation

FLEXAL™ Nitrile Biodegradable Exam Gloves: Our Cardinal Health medical products team incorporates customer feedback at multiple stages of product development. This input informs or validates our product design, drives strategic innovation and helps ensure alignment with clinical needs. With important customer insights and clinical collaboration, we advanced our offerings in exam gloves with the launch of Cardinal Health FLEXAL™ Nitrile Biodegradable Gloves, available now in the U.S. and soon in Canada.ⁱ

“Our customers have expressed a major desire to have more sustainable options in high-use disposables like PPE, and specifically exam gloves, because these products are used in such great volume every day across the care continuum,” said Annie Copeland, global marketing director for Cardinal Health’s PPE portfolio. “The Covid-19 pandemic heightened awareness of the volume of PPE waste ending up landfills, which made biodegradable options more appealing to healthcare providers and suppliers.”

During the manufacturing process for these gloves, an organic additive is introduced to the product, a crucial step that differentiates a biodegradable glove from a standard nitrile glove. The organic additive and subsequent biodegradable process allows the glove to break down nearly 40% through the first year and nearly 75% through the second year in a landfill, while traditional gloves can take decades to biodegrade.ⁱⁱ The product also meets the same standards as traditional nitrile gloves, offering the same storage conditions and a three-year shelf life.

In addition to the biodegradable nature of the product, the corrugate and dispenser cartons for the gloves are recyclable and certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, the leader in sustainable forestry. Each carton of gloves is packed in alternating layers to dispense a single glove at a time, which helps reduce the number of wasted gloves compared to traditional packing methods. 

“We’re proud to offer customers an innovative PPE solution that meets their evolving patient care needs and simultaneously promotes sustainability without compromising protection, which creates a win-win for everyone,” Copeland said.

Hydrogel Anti-Fog Surgical Mask: Clinicians often wear facial protection for long durations which can limit functionality and lead to mask movement, poor adhesion, moisture flow, residue and skin irritation. For lengthy, complex surgeries, clinicians want and need a mask that offers enhanced comfort, a snug fit and reduced moisture build-up or fogging.

Through extensive testing and industry analysis, we generated a solution: The Hydrogel Anti-Fog Surgical Mask, a PPE innovation that provides breakthrough hydrogel anti-fog technology.

“When I do five or six surgeries a day, which I often do, my skin tends to get pretty torn up from other surgical masks. My glasses would get fogged up during surgeries, so I’d have to get a new mask, which means that I have to scrub in again before I return to the surgery,” said Marc J. Michaud, MD, an orthopedic surgeon at Bedford Ambulatory Surgery Center in Bedford, New Hampshire, and an early adopter of the hydrogel mask. “I’ve found that it’s hard to get a good fit with surgical masks, especially because I wear glasses. I don’t have that problem with Cardinal Health’s mask.”

Using the same gentle adhesion hydrogel found in Cardinal Health neonatal electrodes, the team developed an anti-fog surgical mask that forms a moisture barrier across the bridge of the nose, helping reduce skin irritation and adhesive residue upon removal. Compared to conventional anti-fog masks with other forms of adhesives, hydrogel has an absorbative capacity to better manage sweat and exhaled moisture. This helps maintain the adhesion in a high-moisture environment and equilibrates with the skin’s moisture content, so the skin doesn’t macerate or prune up.

“Surgeons require a clear field of view during patient procedures, which drove our development of a design that allows healthcare professionals to maintain comfortability and a clearer view during operative care,” said Kathy Tremblay, director, research and development at Cardinal Health. “Now we have a game-changing mask and a true solution to help enhance the clinician experience.”

Full Coverage Chemotherapy Gowns: Adequate PPE is particularly critical during treatments of chemotherapy patients, because providers can suffer adverse effects if exposed to hazardous drugs while treating their patients. According to an article published by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the wide range of effects includes skin rashes, ocular irritation, headaches, nausea/vomiting, cancer, fetal malformations, reproductive toxicity, organ damage, and DNA mutation.

To help enhance protection and minimize exposure risk for clinicians involved with chemotherapy administration, we created a comprehensive line of Cardinal Health™ Full Coverage Chemotherapy Gowns. Offering Level 4 AAMI protection, the gowns meet strict standards for high fluid protection, providing the highest level of fluid protection against bloodborne pathogens and viruses.

The chemotherapy gown meets U.S. Pharmacopeia (USP) <800> standards for handling hazardous drugs. It protects healthcare personnel from exposure to bodily fluids and 11 types of chemotherapy drugs, from preparation and handling to administration and disposal.ⁱⁱⁱ The gown meets the broad protection Part A requirements of ASTM F3267, standard specification for protective clothing for use against liquid chemotherapy drugs.

As cancer treatment evolves, so do the drug touchpoints in the hospital, from the pharmacy to the different administration sites throughout the facility. To help provide further comfort and protection, the gown is made with a poly-coated material and is a full back-style gown that closes and ties in the back. It provides additional features for clinicians such as reinforced taped seams for added fluid protection and knit cuffs.

Driving confidence with clinicians

Cardinal Health continues to reimagine its PPE offerings through ongoing research and development and a constant focus on driving clinical and patient impact. Through cross-functional collaboration, many of the teams within its medical product and distribution organization work together to continue innovating and delivering solutions that safeguard healthcare workers and patients across multiple care settings.

“Healthcare professionals work tirelessly to provide exceptional care to patients, and they do not pause to consider if their PPE will adequately protect them when moving quickly to immediately treat a patient,” said Larissa Torkelson, RN, MSN, senior global medical advisor for Cardinal Health PPE. “Clinicians expect to have effective PPE, and we appreciate the confidence they have in us to design and provide reliable solutions. It’s our responsibility to continue evolving and innovating a portfolio customers can trust.”