Seattle Children's Hospital recently discovered a sterilization issue at its Bellevue Clinic and Surgery Center and is warning patients of the possibility of infection.
The hospital found that "required cleaning processes for instruments used in certain procedures were not consistently followed" at the Bellevue Clinic. Up to 12,000 children and young adults could have been exposed to hepatitis B and C as well as HIV and other bloodborne illnesses, according to the Seattle Times.
The problem was with the manual cleaning process and not the clinic's machines. The final steam sterilization was performed properly, which means the risk of infection is very low, the Seattle Times reported, but the hospital is sending warning letters to patients' families anyway.
Seattle Children's reported the problem to the county, the state and the CDC and is working with those agencies.