Cleaning Product Could Reduce MRSA Rates
June 30, 2009 Posted by Administrator in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News, Total Clean Services , add a commentAccording to research a new cleaning product could help cut rates of the MRSA superbug by a third.
A study found that levels of MRSA were reduced by a third when wards were treated with Byotrol rather than standard bleach.
The 11-month study at Manchester Royal Infirmary suggests the product could be a useful tool for the health service.
Byotrol was used on two general medical wards, while two others were treated with the NHS’s normal cleaning bleach.
Dr Andrew Dodgson, the consultant microbiologist who led the study, said the results were “very impressive”.
He added: “Cutting the levels of pathogens on the wards reduces the risk to patients of picking up an infection.”
The Manchester research follows earlier tests which found Byotrol cut levels of MRSA by half.
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Treating too Many Patients Leaves Hospitals Unclean
June 10, 2009 Posted by Administrator in : Cleaning News, Contract Cleaning, Hospital Cleaning, News , add a commentAccording to a new report from the British Medical Association, pressure to treat too many patients too quickly leaves little time for proper hospital cleaning.
The BMA also said hospitals should face sanctions if they fail to implement simple strategies like washing hands with soap and water or using alcohol rubs.
Dr Vivienne Nathanson said measures like deep cleaning and bare ‘below the elbows’ needed to be part of the long-term measures and regular, thorough cleaning of hospitals.
She said: ‘Deep cleaning is a good thing provided you go in and do all the other organisational things and keep your cleaning at a high level.’
This includes proper cleaning of things like the buttons on machines and switches, she added: ‘We are not dismissing deep clean but it does not work on its own.’
The report also said that the areas of a hospital that posed the greatest risk to patients were not always included in cleaning contracts.
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Hospital Cleaning Team Wins Award
March 17, 2009 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News, Total Clean Services , add a commentTaunton’s Musgrove Park Hospital cleaning team has won the chairman’s award for excellence.
A panel of judges praised the team for their commitment and positive attitude towards their cleaning duties, and for the significant difference they’ve made to Musgrove.
Cleaning co-ordinator at Musgrove, Ruth Stephens, said: ‘They’re very thorough, take real pride in their work and are always looking to help out. In the last year, we’ve spent over £1m on cleaning and now there are cleaners in the hospital 24 hours a day, seven days a week.’
Chairman Ros Wyke said: ‘Cleanliness is very important to us at Musgrove, and the cleaning teams have helped to reduce our infection rate and improve the hospital environment.’
She added: ‘MRSA is down by over 70% in the last two years – and the teams have played a big role in that.’
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Eye Hospital Told to Clean up Their Act!
March 11, 2009 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News , add a commentAn Eye Hospital in Moorfields has been told to improve the way they clean medical equipment.
A Healthcare Commission report into hygiene at the hospital found laser probes, (which are used to measure patients’ eyes) were not being cleaned properly.
The watchdog has given the hospital six months to improve their standards.
The investigation stated: ‘In the accident and emergency department, we observed staff decontaminating laser probes.’
‘We found that there were no guidelines or protocols for the cleaning of this equipment; the medical staff could not remember having had training on the decontamination of this equipment.’
‘No record was kept of the date that the decontaminating solution for this equipment had been prepared and decontamination was taking place in a clinical rather than processing area.’
However, investigators found that the hospital, which has a worldwide name for pioneering eye treatments, was meeting all other guidelines put in place to stop the spread of superbugs.
Last year the Commission rated the trust as “excellent” for use of resources and “fair” for quality of services in its annual health check.
A spokeswoman for Moorfields Hospital said the breach found by inspectors was a minor one.
She explained: ‘Although this has no impact on patient care, we are now putting in place additional training and guidance for staff responsible for the local cleaning of clinical instruments to assure ourselves and the Healthcare Commission that we will fully comply with this requirement in future.’
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Hospitals Throughout Scotland are to Benefit From New Steam Cleaners.
March 4, 2009 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News , add a commentThe Scottish Government is to distribute 250 steam cleaners at a cost of £400,000.
These will allow for specialist cleaning and when used with micro-fibre cloths are particularly effective against C.difficile.
Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon said: ‘Cleanliness is crucial in our hospitals and is a simple way to help combat infections like MRSA and C.diff.’
‘Steam cleaning is a particularly effective way of cleaning areas affected by C.diff and substantially increasing the number of steam cleaners available to the NHS will ensure they are available locally when needed.’
Across NHS Scotland there are currently 20 steam cleaners which have provided sufficient evidence of their effectiveness, which should encourage the government to invest in more.
Health Facilities in Scotland will purchase the steam cleaning packages on behalf of NHS Scotland.
Over three years the government is to invest £54 million in a range of initiatives designed to tackle hospital super-bugs.
Some of these initiatives include a national MRSA screening programme, 100% single room provision in all new hospitals as well as doctors being prudent in the prescribing of antibiotics.
Highland Hospitals Need to Raise the Awareness & Importance of Cleaning Your Hands
February 4, 2009 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News , add a commentHospitals in Scotland lack clear signs advising patients and staff to clean their hands properly say health chiefs.
Both NHS Highland chairman Gary Coutts and nursing director Heidi May admitted that more could be done in the fight against hospital infections in the region. And they revealed plans to introduce recorded messages in wards, reminding people to wash their hands thoroughly.
Coutts raised concerns that signs advising patients and staff of the importance of washing their hands in the effort to crackdown on infections were unclear.
He said: ‘I was visiting patients quite recently, and I still think we have got some very poor signage. It gets lost in a multitude of other things that are on the wall.’
He was backed by Ms May, the board member in charge of infection control, who said she found “a lack of consistency” in signs in hospitals across the region.
She added: ‘One of the things that we are going to put in place are auditory systems that, when we walk into wards, will say: ‘you need to wash your hands’.’
Machines dispensing hand-washing gel have now been placed at ward entrances and posters outlining ‘six step’ hand washing techniques have been put up.
Cleaning Chemicals Within Hospitals Could be Causing Asthma
January 21, 2009 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News, environment , add a commentResearchers in America have found cleaning chemicals in wards run by nurses, which could irritate the lungs. Including cleansers and antiseptics used on patients’ skin, chemicals used in the sterilisation and all purpose cleaners like bleach.
There are already 5.4m people in the UK receiving treatment for asthma and cleaning products and irritants in the workplace are known to be one of the causes.
The findings of this research are based on a sample of 3,650 healthcare workers.
Cleaning instruments were associated with a 67% increased chance of being diagnosed with asthma and nurses who were exposed to general cleaning products were 72% more likely to have asthma.
Associate Professor Ahmed Arif, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, said: ‘Substituting cleaning agents with environmentally friendly ‘green chemicals’ and using appropriate personal care protection could help minimise occupational exposures in this professional group.’
The research found that nurses who were exposed to adhesives and solvents in the care of patients, were 50% more likely to report symptoms of asthma but not a formal diagnosis.
Prof Arif said: ‘Some of the products containing these chemicals were available as sprays, which increase the potential for aerosolisation. To our knowledge, exposure to these types of compounds has not been previously linked to asthma among nursing professionals and, hence, warrants further evaluation.’
Are the Media to Blame for the Panic Over MRSA, or is it the Problem of Hospitals not Being Clean!
January 14, 2009 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News , add a commentMRSA is of course a serious problem in the UK, but the media have paid it much more attention than other countries, causing us to panic as usual.
A good example of this is that between the years 1997-2007, the USA published 177 articles about MRSA in their papers, whilst the UK wrote 4,300 articles.
Much of the UK newspaper coverage centres on individual’s stories, about young children or celebrities contracting a hospital infection. But the typical victims of MRSA are actually the elderly and the very ill which tend to be missing.
Concentrating on young and relatively healthy victims encourages the public to see the infection as something we should all be afraid of, clever media stuff!
So what about the media’s focus on the cleanliness of our hospitals?
Well whilst hospital cleaning is part of the answer, so is the reduction of antibiotics, which is regarded as one of the most effective ways of reducing MRSA.
The media should of course tell the whole story about MRSA, but that wouldn’t sell nearly as many papers would it!
C. Difficile Outbreak Means Hospital Ward has to be Closed
December 30, 2008 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, News , add a commentThere has been an outbreak of the C. Difficile infection in Craigavon Area Hospital in County Armagh.
Apparently seven new cases of C. Diff have emerged in the last two weeks, The Southern Health Trust have said it is a higher number than expected.
Dr Patrick Loughran explained: ‘The ward is closed to further admissions and deep cleaning has been initiated.’
He said other measures to control the outbreak included screening people with diarrhoea at A& E.
The trust said the rise in C. Diff cases had coincided with an increase in patients admitted to hospital with the winter vomiting and diarrhoea bug, also known as the norovirus.
Dr Loughran added: ‘We are asking all visitors to follow the Trust’s visiting policy which includes no more than two visitors per bed, and cleaning their hands before and after visiting.’
‘We would urge the local community not to visit the hospital unless absolutely necessary.’
New Cleaning Product Reduces Spread of C-Difficile
December 4, 2008 Posted by Katie in : Cleaning News, Hospital Cleaning, environment , add a commentA new cleaning product that has been developed, could “significantly reduce” the rates of the hospital superbug Clostridium difficile, say researchers.
A study found that the product, Byotrol, led to a reduced presence of the infection C diff, in the wards where it was tried out.
In the areas cleaned with Byotrol, C diff was present in 20.4% of the sites tested, compared to 27.8% of the sites cleaned with traditional products.
According to the research, the number of patients who developed diarrhoea due to the potentially fatal bug was 50% lower in the wards cleaned with the new product.
The study was run in four hospital wards within the Manchester Royal Infirmary. Two of the wards were cleaned using Byotrol and the other two with bleach.
Dr Richard Deed said: ‘These results show that it is possible to drive significant reductions in one of the most persistent and challenging micro-organisms found within the healthcare system.’
Byotrol, which is cost comparable to most other day-to-day cleaners being used in wards, was made available to hospitals on the NHS supply chain in November.
