Check with your insurance. They may pay for IV3000 or other barrier tape.
You have to check with your state as to how they want sharps handled, but the applicator is considered itās own self-contained sharps container, since the needle is secured inside the heavy plastic. Generally, yes, you just toss it in your trashā¦ Unless of course, the area you live in requires special handling.
As a G6 + pump user, I compare the net waste to MDI and BGM. If you were to do 2 injections per day, a new syringe each time and dispose of the 12 syringes, it is more material than a Tandem cartridge and infusion set.
Every CGM and inserter except possbly the Eversense is a larger amount of non-recyleable material than BGM strips that can be thrown in garbage. Even strip vials, when separated from their desiscant are potientally recycleable. Intact, they are good as glucose tablet carriers and for seed storage.
A careful insulin syringe user could reuse a syringe several times, recap the needle each time, and when done with it, snap off the needle at the hub. Thatās a 75% saving with a single use. With 4 uses ā a 94% saving in medical hazardous āshapsā waste. The syirnge body, plunger and seal are all materials that could be recycled.
SO Iām more upset that only a small amount of the materials that could be recycled in the US ARE recycled in the US, and also that our laws donāt require that things like the D6 inserter be designed for simple separation by the consumer of the truly hazardous material from that which could be recycled.
The US still mostly buries its difficult disposal problems, burn what it can allows the rest to be shipped it to other countries. How bad is it? So bad that CHINA now officailly bans the importation of electronics for recycling
I admit that Iām selfish, but I do try to deconstruct everything that I buy into its recycleable materials when Iām done with it.
The only material used in the G6 inserters construction and packaging that is medically hazardous is the insertion needle. The other two steel needle-like parts are part of the cocked-spring retention and never touch blood.
The entire G6 inserter can be diassembled in 3 minutes - less if the assembly is limited to prying off the shell, lifting off the coil coil cover and removing the coil spring. This can be done with a pen knife. Thatās 75% of the inserter material. The 3 āneedlesā are less than 1% of the inserter and can be removed from the plastic using needle nose pliers .
The outer packaging is 100% recycleable. The G6 sensor wire carrier and adhesive can be removed from the base, which is a recyleable material. I remove all three needles and dispose of them like I did with my syringe needles. The adhesive pad can be treated like a used bloody bandaid. Unless there is a contagious disease present that is blood-borne and long-lived outside a host the adhesive pad can be disposed of as common garbage.
The G7 inserter looks more compact, but withut having one to examine, I canāt tell if it is a more responsible use of material.
From a disposal standpoint, the G7 sensors are worse than the G6 because the number of sealled batery-containing devices is tripled. Battery-containing devices must be segregated from all other medical waste, which is ususally burned. Batteries cannot be burned.
1 Like
Itās not coded with type type plastic.
| Plastics which are typically accepted by curbside recycling programs*: | Plastics which are not typically accepted by curbside recycling programs*: |
|---|---|
| #1- Polyethylene Terephthalate PETE | #3- Polyvinyl Chloride PVC |
| #2- High Density Polyethylene HDPE | #4- Low Density Polyethylene LDPE |
| #5- Polypropylene PP | #6- Polystyrene PS |
| #7- Other |
| What are the Different Plastic Recycling Codes? (Examples & Disposal) | Imperial Dade
I just looked at the one I used this evening.
No mark and it doesnāt look exactly like the applicator in your picture.
Video on dismantling a G6 applicator.
Iām in the US. The product as shown in that May 2021 video is from Germany and is packaged differently. It lacks the dots on my blister pack.
But this is from the same video. It shows the recycle symbol, just in a slightly different position:
Maybe itās different between countries, but every one that Iāve received since I started in April 2022 has had the same blister packaging, including the 1-packs that Iām sent as replacements. They all had the type 1 symbol somewhere.
The photo I included in my previous post is of a Dexcom CGM that I just pulled from a DME distributor-only carton of 3, still in its unopened blister pack. The pull-off paper with the part and serial numbers says āDexcom Inc, 6340 Sequence Drive, San Diego, CA 92121 USAā
btw, Iāve watched many of that channels videos. They helped me to choose the Dexcom G6 and Tandem pump and solve some practical problems using them.
That recycling code 1 is for the blister pack not the applicator. There are no codes on any of the applicator parts.
BTW, I just shared the video, not mine, but I will be watching more of his stuff.
Your original comment regarding my post was about the outer packaging not the applicator. I agree the applicator itself has no recycling symbols on it.
Personally, I find it objectionable that such markings arenāt present because all of the materials of the applicator with the exception of the three needles could be safely recycled if they had been labeled by the manufacturer.
Whatās more shameful is that the applicator canāt be easily separated from the āsharpā to permit the remainder to be disposed of as normal garbage.
Compared it to the applicator for an Autosoft Xc. Thatā's all plastic except for the inserting needle and can be disassemble without tools. Far less material is used .compared to the Dexcom inserter which has to deliver less total mass and is a Rube Goldberg kludge.
My guess is liability concerns is why there is no recycling coding on the applicator. The concern is that people would injure themselves taking it apart. And if coded the whole device including sharps would be put in recycling bin.
I believe Iām entitled to an apology for you forgetting your own previous post criticizing something that I didnāt say.
Dexcom needs lawyers to protect them because the liability stems from a design, neither optimized for production nor ecologically sound disposal.
It was done the way that they did it because they lack imagination and do not consider total life cycle costs, but only how to put something together that will work well enough to satisfy the FDA.
Iām an engineer and I can recognize a very badly designed machine when I take one apart.
It looks like the G7 May benefit from the wide spread criticism of the poor packaging of their technology by the people who have to use it everyday. Iāll reserve my opinion on that until I get one to deconstruct.
I am not clear on what this means. Please explain, thank you.
I apologize for not seeing your text. I was distracted by looking at the image and not realizing that the code was on the package since it was the applicator still in the package.
Looking more closely, I can see that it is applicator in the package.
Accepted. I understand.
I was in a particularly grumpy mood when I read your response
you arenāt the only one who spends more time talking and writing than listening and reading,
Iām guilty of it too
more than once Iāve posted something and discovered that there were comments made while I was composing it that I never saw before I signed of.
iām having a problem dictating this right now not sure when Iāll be back
2 Likes