Neat trick: Used needles won't prick

Jeff Soinski had done it dozens, if not hundreds, of times, and he seemed so casual. But it's not every day someone tries to stab himself in the hand with needles.

With vigor. Repeatedly.

By the time Soinski was finished, one of the needles, a mean-looking sucker about 4 inches long, was bent like a hockey stick.

But not a drop of blood anywhere. And that was the entire point.

Keeping people from being pricked with needles is the reason Specialized Health Products International Inc. is able to stick around. The Bountiful-based company develops, manufactures and markets disposable medical safety needles, allowing health-care providers to avoid both the pain of accidental needlesticks and their potential life-threatening ramifications.

"There are a lot of sticks. There are dangerous sticks. It is a big deal, and it's just another thing that's challenging nurses," said Soinski, president and chief executive officer of SHPI.

"We're trying to bring very simple, elegant, cost-efficient design to solve this very real problem. The consequences of needlesticks — not only the health consequences, the cost impact on the health-care system, but the emotional consequences — you can imagine, are huge."

SHPI statistics indicate that U.S. health-care workers use more than 6 billion needles annually. And from an estimated 800,000 accidental needlesticks and sharps injuries annually, about 1,000 result in serious infections. Blood-borne diseases — including HIV/AIDS, hepatitis B and C — can be transmitted easily.

Soinski can relate. He once accidentally stuck himself with a patient needle while working in a lab. After that, he freaked out "for months," he said.

Don't get stuck

But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates more than 80 percent of accidental needlesticks can be prevented by using safety devices such as those produced by SHPI. More than just hollow metal pins, these needles feature technologies that allow plastic to slide, unfold or otherwise move over the needlepoint or have the needle automatically retract entirely.

SHPI has 12 marketed product lines. One batch is known as Huber needles, which poke through the skin and into a surgically implanted port that allows the patient to, for example, receive chemotherapy. When such needles are removed, the caregiver must put fingers on the skin above the port and prepare for a "rebound" effect should the needle come out all at once.

SHPI's MiniLoc Safety Infusion Set has a low profile and small footprint, and when a set of plastic "wings" are pulled to withdraw the needle from the patient, a plastic mechanism extends along each side of the needle. An audible click and a small color indicator let the user know the needlepoint is locked out.