Stratus Building Solutions of Portland explains why deep cleaning your hospital and healthcare facility is important.
With many patients and staff around every day, cleaning and disinfecting your healthcare facility is crucial, not only to meet the CDC guidelines but to promote safety and prevent diseases from spreading.
Stratus Building Solutions of Portland shares expert opinions on how often you should deep clean your healthcare facility and the best practices for deep cleaning hospital facilities.
Why Should You Deep Clean Hospital Facilities?
Deep cleaning and sanitizing are required in healthcare facilities to help prevent the spread of infections and promote a safe healthcare environment. But besides meeting the requirements, cleaning your healthcare facility is crucial to protect the health of your staff and patients.
Different patients bring different infections and diseases into the hospital, and these diseases can spread easily, making hospitals a breeding ground for germs and a place where you can easily contact infections.
By working with a professional cleaning company and regularly deep cleaning, and maintaining your healthcare facility, you can reduce health risks and promote the safety of your staff. Sterilizing and deep cleaning your health facility will help to ensure that your medical and non-medical staff work in a safe place and are protected from the risk of contracting viruses and infections.
A clean healthcare environment also helps to protect each patient and prevent them from exchanging germs. There are so many points in the hospitals where patients are in close range and interact with each other; sanitizing your environment will reduce the spread of germs and bacteria by ensuring that all surfaces are clean and safe to touch.
Also, deep cleaning and disinfecting your environment will help to ensure that patients’ wounds do not get infected and everyone in the facility is safe and protected.
Understanding the Different Types of Cleaning for Hospitals
There are many types of cleaning services that your hospital can use, such as floor treatment, disinfecting, window cleaning, and general cleaning. However, all these cleaning services fall under two main types of cleaning; routine cleaning and deep cleaning. Read on to learn more about these two types of cleaning and how they differ from each other.
Routine Cleaning
Generally, the primary purpose of routine cleaning is to maintain the cleanliness of your facility. Routine or regular cleaning services involve your usual cleaning activities. Depending on your preference, you can do your routine cleaning once a week, once in two weeks, or once a month.
However, the CDC advises that hospitals carry out daily routine cleaning of the facility to reduce contamination and the spread of diseases.
When you hire a professional cleaning company for your routine cleaning, they will focus on basic tasks that will keep your facility clean and well-maintained.
Some of the activities included in routine cleaning include cleaning floors and surfaces, cleaning windows and glass, disposing of trash cans in patients’ rooms, and disinfecting surfaces.
Deep Cleaning
Deep cleaning services involve more extensive and detailed cleaning activities than routine cleaning. Here, the goal is not just to maintain your facility but to sanitize it, eliminate germs, and keep the environment safe.
Deep cleaning is not required frequently, but when carried out, it involves wiping down the entire facility, cleaning and disinfecting rooms, sanitizing floors and surfaces, and removing anything that might spread infections or contaminate the environment.
Deep cleaning also includes most of the activities carried out in regular cleaning, but here the cleaning is done with more attention to detail. It involves emptying the wards and cleaning them, thoroughly cleaning the beds and other fixtures in the rooms, removing tough stains from floors and windows, and cleaning hard-to-reach areas and areas that are usually neglected.
When doing deep cleaning, most cleaning services use disinfecting systems that detect and eliminate up to 99% of bacteria from your facility.
Key Differences Between Routine Cleaning and Deep Cleaning
The main difference between routine cleaning and deep cleaning services is the goal they aim to achieve. While routine cleaning aims to keep your facility clean and well-maintained, deep cleaning is done to eliminate germs and reduce contamination.
Another difference between these two types of cleaning is time. Since it involves more activities, deep cleaning takes more time to complete than routine cleaning, and unlike regular cleaning, deep cleaning doesn’t have to be done every day or every week.
Also, because it involves more work and takes more time, deep cleaning typically costs more money than routine cleaning. However, regular deep cleaning provides a cleaner, safer environment, and it helps to improve your staff’s and patients' confidence in your facility.
How Often Should You Deep Clean Your Health Care Facility
One question that most healthcare facility managers usually ask is how often they should deep clean their facility. There is no direct answer to this question, as your deep cleaning schedule depends on many factors, including your facility type, size, and cleaning needs.
Expert Recommendations for Deep Cleaning Frequency
The frequency of healthcare facility deep cleaning varies from one facility to the other and depends on factors such as the nature of care and vulnerability to contamination.
While it is advisable to deep clean your hospital at least once a month, you can also work with an experienced commercial cleaning company that will evaluate your facility and draws up a deep cleaning schedule that suits your facility.
Factors That Determine Deep Cleaning Frequency
Many factors determine how often you should deep clean your facility, and they include the following:
1. Level of Contact
Areas with more patient contact need to be cleaned more frequently than areas with lesser contact. If your hospital has many places of high contact, you should schedule a more frequent deep cleaning and sanitize and disinfect your facility often.
2. Nature of Activities
The type or nature of healthcare activities carried out in your facility also determines the frequency of your deep cleaning. For example, facilities that are used for surgical activities are exposed to more blood and should be deep cleaned more frequently. In other words, the higher the exposure to bacteria in your healthcare facility, the more frequently you should do a deep clean.
3. Vulnerability of Patients
If you have more patients who are vulnerable to infections in your hospital, you should go the extra mile to clean your facility and reduce the presence of germs and bacteria.
For example, patients with severe burns or open wounds, patients undergoing surgical operations, patients with sterile devices inserted in major blood tissues, and patients undergoing any form of invasive procedure are more vulnerable to infections and should be protected.
On the other hand, patients undergoing dental, orthopedic, or other non-invasive treatments are considered less vulnerable, and the areas they occupy may not need frequent deep cleaning.
Best Practices for Deep Cleaning Hospital Facilities
Your hospital deep cleaning should be done with safety and protection in mind. You should hire commercial cleaners experienced with hospital cleaning to deep clean your facility. Ensure your cleaning staff uses the safest cleaning products and equipment for your deep cleaning and covers every area of your building. They must follow standard principles and policies and promote safety in their hospitals.
Overview of the Deep Cleaning Process for Hospitals
There are various processes and procedures involved in deep cleaning hospitals and health facilities, and they include the following activities;
- Empty and disinfect the trash cans in every room.
- Dust every area and surface with clean cloths or dusters.
- Clean every surface and room in the facility with safe, eco-friendly products.
- Clean high-touch surfaces and remove tough stains.
- Sanitize and disinfect the facility to eliminate germs and prevent the spread of bacteria.
- Vacuum, mop, and disinfect floors.
- Inspect and clean again if necessary.
Tips for Choosing the Right Commercial Cleaning Company
Considering how important deep cleaning is, it is key to choose the right cleaning company to do your hospital deep cleaning to get the best results. Stratus Building Solutions of Portland shares some tips to help you choose the right commercial cleaning for your hospital, and they include the following;
- Ask for referrals from family and colleagues.
- Hold interviews with selected companies and ask about their competencies and experience.
- Ask about their cleaning and disinfecting process.
- Learn about their hiring process and the quality of their employees.
- Ensure that the company has liability insurance.
- Ask for their price rate and ensure that they do not overcharge you.
Conclusion
Hospitals, dental clinics, nursing homes, outpatient centers, and other healthcare facilities are places people go to for treatment to get well. But if these places are not well cleaned and properly maintained, they can quickly become a breeding ground for germs and infections, putting patients' lives in danger.
This is why you must invest more time and attention into cleaning your facility, hire the best commercial cleaning company and schedule a timely deep cleaning for your hospital or healthcare facility.
Professional Deep Cleaning Services for Hospitals in Portland, OR
If you need a deep cleaning service you trust for your health care facility in Portland, Salem, and other areas in Oregon, Stratus Building Solutions of Portland is your best choice.
Status Building Solutions of Portland is a leading commercial cleaning franchise providing efficient and reliable cleaning services for businesses and facilities across all industries in Portland, OR.
It has franchises in multiple locations in the state, with experienced janitors who will use modern equipment and safe products to thoroughly clean and sanitize your facility to ensure that it meets high standards and is safe for your staff and patients.
For inquiries about their services, contact Stratus Building Solutions of Portland at (503) 461-0849 or visit their website.
