Ascent, in partnership with Perfecseal, Inc., has been honored with a Gold Medal by the Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) for the GYRUS ACMI device packaging. Given during the 2010 SPE Thermoforming Competition, the award not only recognizes Ascent’s world-class packaging design, it also demonstrates Ascent’s commitment to lower the environmental footprint of healthcare and optimize resources to support quality care.

In cooperation with Perfecseal, Ascent re-designed the packaging for its GYRUS ACMI device to alleviate common industry pain points around medical packaging. The new packaging is 100 percent recyclable, utilizes 20 percent less material than the OEM packaging and minimizes waste generated by hospitals while enhancing aseptic transfer.

“Our new GYRUS packaging demonstrates Ascent’s overall commitment to protect the quality of patient care while helping to preserve the environment,” said Lars Thording, Senior Director of Marketing and Public Affairs, Ascent. “To some, redesigning our packaging may seem like a minor change; but when it comes to reducing the environmental footprint of healthcare delivery, making small changes can make a big difference.”

Ascent has helped hundreds of hospitals reduce their environmental footprint through reprocessing and remanufacturing medical devices that are marketed in North America as “single use” by the original manufacturer and are often needlessly thrown away. Ascent’s programs divert more than 5.3 million pounds of medical waste from local landfills each year. That’s equivalent to one pound of waste every six seconds.