Behind the instruments: Sterilization supports care at Naval Health Clinic Oak Harbor

Naval Health Clinic Oak Harbor:

"OAK HARBOR, Wash. — Before a dental instrument can return to the treatment room at Naval Health Clinic Oak Harbor, it spends about four hours moving through a process most patients never see.

For Bryan Craig, a sterilization technician who processes approximately 150 to 200 items a day, that time represents a responsibility: helping ensure the instruments used to care for Sailors and other beneficiaries are ready for their next patient.

Craig works under the clinic’s dental directorate, but his responsibilities reach beyond dental care. He also processes instruments for medical home port, aviation medicine, optometry, pediatrics and audiology. His work supports the services that keep Sailors healthy and ready to carry out the Navy’s mission.

The process begins on the decontamination side of the clinic’s sterile processing department, where used instruments arrive for cleaning. Instruments move through a sequence that includes presoaking, ultrasonic cleaning and a washer before reaching the clean side for wrapping and sterilization.

Craig has a less formal name for the washer.

“I call it my glorified dishwasher,” he said.

The comparison is familiar. The work requires a carefully managed sequence, with time built in for each stage.

The washer cycle takes about an hour. Wrapping and preparing instruments adds more time before they enter a sterilizer for approximately another hour. Afterward, instruments need about an hour to cool before they can be distributed to the clinics.

Those steps help explain why returning an instrument to service takes more than a few minutes.

“A lot of people don’t know that,” Craig said. “Most people think it’s a quick, easy process. It takes time.”

Managing that turnaround is part of supporting patient care across multiple departments. Each instrument must complete the process before returning to the health care teams that depend on it. Keeping the equipment operating is another part of the job.

The machines rely on steam, water, and electricity, and Craig said breakdowns can require costly repairs and time to resolve. Preventive maintenance and troubleshooting help keep the department moving, while Craig performs daily checks that include biological testing used to monitor the sterilization process.

He credits the maintenance support he receives with helping keep the equipment running and allowing him to focus on processing instruments.

Craig’s connection to the clinic began in 1996, when he arrived as a contract dental assistant. He spent 15 years as a contractor before an opportunity in sterile processing changed the direction of his work.

As the department’s technician prepared to retire, Craig began filling in during her absences. That experience eventually led him to take the position.

Over the years, he has also seen the clinic’s sterile processing operations change. Medical and dental processing once had separate technicians before the functions merged. Craig later moved into the department’s current space following a renovation in 2018.

His perspective reaches back further. Craig entered the Navy in 1982 and said the methods and equipment used to process instruments have changed considerably since then.

What keeps him interested is the work itself - and the people it serves. “I love the job. I love working with the people,” Craig said.

For patients, much of that work remains out of sight. For Craig, its purpose is straightforward: making sure the people receiving care can depend on the instruments used to treat them."