Handheld Vapor Phase Hydrogen Peroxide Decontamination Device

This project describes the design and setup of a handheld vapor phase hydrogen peroxide (VHP) decontamination device, and its compatibility on drug-eluting polyester medical fabrics. Unlike the current bulky VHP devices (e.g., truck trailers and wheels-on-carts), our handheld device provides a robust deployment with a comparable VHP concentration for local decontamination. In this study, we evaluated the physicomechanical changes of drug-eluting PLA fabrics after 1, 3 and 5 hours of VHP decontamination between 180 to 200 ppm. Mechanical properties of the drug-eluting PLA fibers decreased while the area and weight remained unchanged for all decontamination conditions. The decrease in mechanical properties could be due to the crystallization of the small drug molecules. In summary, our work demonstrated the engineering design and setup of a small handheld decontamination device with scientific understandings of materials compatibility in VHP-treated drug-eluting polyester medical fabrics.