Mold likes to grow in warm moist places.  When it has something to feed on such as milk moisture you can often see black growing in the tubes right up where it is pushed into the flange.  I tell my mothers to purchase white vinegar (cider vinegar turns them yellow) and pour the vinegar into a bowl (large marjarine container with lid works well) and push the tubing down into the vinegar.  I tell her to likewise do this with her flanges if there is a lime build-up.  After an hours soaking the flanges and tubing come out sparkling.  Now she needs to wash the vinegar smell out.  If she has been boiling the flanges and there is a lime build-up she will see the lime swirling down in the bottom of the bowl.  Putting the tubings down into soapy dishwater, holding t
hem up to the running tapwater to rinse and then go outside and swing them around in a circle to get most of the moisture out of the tube. I show them how to use oxygen or compressed air here in the hospital.  Air drying works best.  When we put freshly washed or rinsed flanges into plastic and place in a dark warm spot (the inside of a Pump In Style) it produces a great medium for growth.
        This cannot be prevented when at work but at home air-drying is best. I learned this from being a former respiratory therapist.  When I told a mom from outside our City who was staying with friends while her baby was in NICU not to hide the kit in the plastic bag freshly after washing it at night but keep it on the drainboard, she replied that at the housing project where they are staying there are many cockroaches.
        I felt badly for her having to tell me this but I never forgot it.


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