The cleaning of health centers and hospitals is part of the specialized professional cleaning services.
Given the specialization and to have good guarantees, in some countries, cleaning companies that provide their services in the health and hospital field, among other requirements, are required to present certificates of quality and professionalism.
The complexity and characteristics of each center will determine the preparation of a specific cleaning protocol by the medical department in charge, which will transmit the information to those responsible for the contracted cleaning company for its implementation.
The cleaning protocols of health centers are not set in stone but will be constantly reviewed, depending on the specific needs and circumstances of each moment.
Cleaning protocols for health centers and hospitals can be reviewed or modified because of situations such as:
-A greater or lesser occupancy of beds.
-Situations of high epidemiological risk.
-Saturation of operating rooms.
-Refurbishment works, extension, or maintenance of the facilities.
-New internal rules in the operation of the health center or hospital.
-Implementation of new technology methods in cleaning and disinfection.
But before continuing, the first thing we have to understand in order to know how to clean health centers correctly is the aim pursued when providing these services in these types of places.
At SCS Group Cleaning, we have extensive experience in many specialized cleaning, and that is why today we are going to see what variables are involved when performing cleaning services for health centers correctly:
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT THE CLEANING OF HEALTH CENTERS?
- Objectives of cleaning health centers
- Identification of priority cleaning areas in health centers
- Standards for the development of procedures and services in the cleaning of health centers
- Methods for cleaning health centers
- Periodicity of cleaning health centers
- Conservation of products, utensils, and machinery for cleaning health centers
- Specific personal training for cleaning health centers
Objectives of cleaning health centers
It is essential to understand the special characteristics that distinguish these facilities from others, in order to carry out methodical and orderly work, in which procedures are so important, such as the order of intervention in the spaces, in order to achieve the greatest guarantees of disinfection and cleaning of health centers and hospitals.
Identification of priority cleaning areas in health centers
In order to clean health centers correctly, it is necessary beforehand that they establish certain areas that will mark the procedures and order of cleaning based on the greater or lesser risk that certain contamination of the environment by bacteria, spores, or bacteria may generate in patients. germs
Normally, three or four differentiated zones are established:
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Low-risk areas :
- Waiting rooms, entrances, corridors.
- Public elevators and stairs.
- Reception, offices, and external consultations.
- Cafeteria, changing rooms, public toilets.
- Machinery installations and warehouses.
- Patios and terraces.
- Chapel and outdoor areas.
There are areas with a lower risk of contamination for patients when cleaning health centers correctly, although cleaning we carry tasks out with the same care as in other areas.
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Medium risk areas:
- Diagnosis and treatment areas.
- Hospitalization plants.
- Rehabilitation areas.
- Pharmacy area.
- Laundry.
- Kitchens.
- Morgue.
These are areas in which we specifically marked the use of products and the way of carrying out cleaning tasks in health centers in the cleaning protocol of each center. They may require the use of protection systems by operators.
- Higher risk areas :
- Laboratories.
- Infectious disease treatment areas.
- Emergencies.
In these areas and in the sterile zones, the operators with the greatest experience and seniority will work, because of the greater responsibility that disinfection of these spaces entails when cleaning health centers correctly.
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Sterile areas:
Operating room area.
Standards for the development of procedures and services in the cleaning of health centers
With how to clean health centers correctly, it is essential that the staff scrupulously follow a series of rules, in order to avoid contamination from one space to another, protecting patients and other users from infections. , and whose compliance also supposes a guarantee of protection for the same workers who carry out the cleaning services.
Among the most common rules are:
- In each intervention, dispose of single-use gloves after use in the space designated for this purpose, after the service.
- The cleaning staff must use the designated changing room in each area. We can do this with the use of disposable caps, slippers, or masks.
- In any space, to clean health centers correctly, you should always clean from the inside out, from the cleanest areas to the dirtiest, and from the highest to the lowest parts.
- We must take care with the ventilation of spaces. To avoid air currents that can facilitate the movement of microorganisms from one area to another.
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Clean every time you see dirt.
- To clean health centers correctly, systems that raise dust cannot be used, and we must always use wet procedures both when sweeping with a mop and when cleaning furniture with a damp cloth, ensuring that we completely wrung it out to avoid excess moisture.
- In areas with a lot of dirt and organic spills, such as blood, vomit, or excrement, before carrying out a total cleaning, we must remove the spills using the most appropriate means depending on the surface, using the necessary PPE or protective equipment. .
- To clean health centers correctly, you cannot use products of free choice, or combine them at will, but you must use those determined by the center, and in the doses shown, leaving the established time to act.
- We will not usually use sprays unless the protocol shows it.
- Each cleaner has to carry all the cleaning products and supplies in their car. They must be perfectly clean and tidy, and which normally stay outside the rooms.
- All cleaning materials must be clean, disinfected, and perfectly tidy after the working day, and the products must be closed and always in their original packaging if we want to clean health centers correctly.
We must also keep the space in which we store utensils and cleaning products in perfect clean conditions.
- The materials and utensils used in the cleaning and disinfection of high-risk and sterile areas must be specific and differentiated by color from those used in other areas, as well as single-use, except for floor cleaning, which it must be of unique use and color for each area.
- To clean the floors, you must use the double bucket system, which contains a disinfection product for scrubbing, and in another bucket, the water alone for rinsing. We must empty the buckets after cleaning each room, and their content replaced again.
- We must carry the collection of the different waste out in carts and containers. For the exclusive use of this service and in fully closed bags,
Methods for cleaning health centers
In this section, we explain some necessary issues to clean health centers correctly.
- Floor cleaning: Inpatient rooms always start with the cleanest part, ending with cleaning the bathroom, which is the dirtiest area. Change the water and products in the double bucket for each room. First introduce the mop with the cloth into the bucket that contains the disinfectant product and scrub in sections. First the cleanest part, then rinse the mop in the bucket that contains plain water, as drained as possible.
- Cleaning of other surfaces: You have to pour the dose of the product stated in each bucket, according to colors designated for cleaning toilets, etc…, and moisten the cloth of the color assigned to each surface, make passes, without rinsing or drying so that it acts on each product. The contents of the buckets will also have to be refilled with clean content. After cleaning a room or space as a general rule.
Periodicity of cleaning health centers
The periodicity to clean health centers correctly will be determined by the cleaning protocol of each center and will vary depending on whether the use of the areas increases or decreases.
But the usual periodicity is:
- In sterile and high-risk areas, such as operating rooms, we must clean all surfaces after each intervention or use.
- In rooms, there will be a daily cleaning of beds, railings, buttons, lamps, bedside tables, TV, controls, chairs, cabinet doors, handles, etc…, as well as floors and toilets.
- Weekly, it is advisable to carry out a deeper cleaning that includes walls, ceilings, windows, doors, and mattresses.
- In cleaning health centers correctly, you have to do a daily scrubbing of the floors in all areas, handrails, furniture, and other surfaces. And we observe every time dirt, we will carry a maintenance task out.
Conservation of products, utensils, and machinery for cleaning health centers
To clean health centers correctly, and prevent subsequent cleaning actions from becoming contaminating acts, it is necessary that we need to use clean materials.
Specific personal training for cleaning health centers
Cleaning workers in health centers and hospitals must be trained both in using protective equipment and in carrying out the tasks assigned to them, knowing the risks inherent to their work, their responsibility in the handling of the tools and machinery, as well as the procedures and the order in carrying out the tasks and knowing the different waste, and where to deposit them.
They also have to undergo training in dealing with patients and the public. In order to know how to adapt adequately to the situations that they may encounter.
They must know the specific products that they have to use, and the dosages for each function.
Preferably, the cleaning companies of health centers usually assign these centers to permanent workers on the staff, with professional experience.
If after reading this post, you need more information, at SCS Group Cleaning Solution, we have a personal service department where we will be happy to assist you.