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Recommended Work Practices: Pipettes and Pipetting Aids

Mouth pipetting is strictly prohibited. Mechanical pipetting aids must be used. Confine pipetting of biohazardous or toxic fluids to a biosafety cabinet if possible. Use the following precautions:

• Always use cotton-plugged pipettes when pipetting biohazardous or toxic fluids.
• Never prepare any kind of biohazardous mixtures by suction and expulsion through a pipette.
• Biohazardous materials should not be forcibly discharged from pipettes. Use "to deliver" pipettes rather than those requiring "blowout."
• Do not discharge biohazardous material from a pipette at a height. Whenever possible allow the discharge to run down the container wall.
• Place contaminated, reusable pipettes horizontally in a pan containing enough liquid disinfectant to completely cover them.
• Autoclave the pan and pipettes as a unit before processing them for reuse.
• Discard contaminated Pasteur pipettes in an appropriate size sharps container.
• When work is performed inside a biosafety cabinet, all pans or sharps containers for contaminated glassware should be placed inside the cabinet as well while in use.

Recommended Work Practices: Sharps

Biosafety Manual Table of Contents