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https://www.hse.gov.uk/biosafety/blood-borne-viruses/laundry-treatments.htm)
A new standard of clean
John Goetz, Global Product Manager at Hydro Systems, explains how using the right chemical dispensers and implementing best practices can help remove harmful pathogens, enhance safety and improve the quality of the wash for commercial laundries.
If there’s one certainty from the unpredictable global pandemic, it’s that COVID-19 has heightened expectations of cleanliness. The coronavirus crisis has brought an acute focus on cleaning requirements to limit the spread of pathogens, including laundering.
Throughout this pandemic and beyond, on-premise and commercial laundry programs will need to follow standard procedures to ensure laundry is properly sanitised and handled in a way that will protect staff, visitors and patients in hospitals, nursing homes as well as other types of healthcare environments.
Contaminated and improperly laundered textiles can facilitate the spread of disease. While laundering doesn’t completely remove these microorganisms, the combination of temperature, time, chemical and mechanical action can significantly reduce the numbers to safe levels by killing or even inactivating harmful pathogens such as bacteria, fungi and viruses.
Universal laundry basics
When it comes to the basics of laundry, what is true during a global pandemic is also true when the risk of an outbreak is low. Unfortunately, improper laundering practices have been identified as contributing to multiple recent outbreaks, offering a real risk of soiled items transferring infection to laundry workers and patients.
Infections caused by soiled linens are most commonly viral, such as smallpox, hepatitis, coronavirus and norovirus, but they have also been linked to fungal or bacterial growth. Coronavirus, for example, can live for hours or even days on surfaces made from a variety of materials, including textiles.
With huge volumes of laundry requiring cleaning and sanitisation in every wash cycle, understanding correct laundry management is crucial. Laundry programs should re-emphasize proper techniques and approach, including:
• Wash formula: Bleach (sodium hypochlorite) is often added to the wash process to sanitise and bleach linen. Combined with high wash temperatures, bleach can quickly kill pathogens. However, many laundries opt to use bleaching agents with hydrogen peroxide instead of chlorinated bleach. Although hydrogen peroxide is safe to use on coloured fabrics, when used at the same levels of sodium hypochlorite, it doesn’t offer antimicrobial benefits. Additionally, without proper dilution rates, the detergent might not effectively remove microorganisms.
• pH levels: Employing rapid pH shifts can kill certain microorganisms, such as fungi. With a pH-sensitive pathogen, it’s important to adjust laundry pH levels
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accordingly. For example, souring rapidly to a pH of five or below has proven effective.
• Wash temperature: Higher wash temperatures can kill and remove more microorganisms. Although moderate temperatures can inactivate most viruses, more resistant viruses, like hepatitis B, may require higher wash temperatures. Studies show that some microorganisms survive temperatures as high as 71°C for periods less than 25 minutes. Therefore, you must ensure your washers reach the desired temperature for the appropriate amount of time.
• Wash mechanics: Viruses adhere less effectively to linen than bacteria. Consequently, they’re removed more easily by the washer’s mechanical action, which does as much to remove them as the temperature and chemicals do to inactivate them. Bear in mind that older washers may not be as operationally effective.
• Dryer temperature: Drying temperatures are generally high, which helps drop bacterial counts by 95%. Therefore, it’s important to ensure equipment reaches the necessary temperature to inactivate germs.
• Handling procedures: Handling laundry contaminated with bodily fluids requires a comprehensive laundry program that fulfils required standards. Employees need training on handling and sorting and using equipment properly, while refraining from bringing contaminants near the processing area. An employer’s responsibilities extend to providing the necessary personal protective equipment (PPE) to do the job safely. It’s also vital that clean laundry is properly transported and stored to avoid contamination. Anything improperly sorted or handled post-washing needs to be rewashed according to facility procedures.
Employing the correct approach can help limit the spread of infection and quite literally save lives. Several essential components ensure laundering reduces the rate of fungal, bacterial and viral survival. By focusing on and improving these areas to create a comprehensive laundry program, laundries can achieve cleaner results and enhance safety for staff, patients and guests.
Smart dispensers, great benefits
The right balance of wash agitation, time, temperature and chemical is key to removing stains and sanitising linens such as gowns, towels or blankets. Chemical dispensing systems provide the correct measurements every time and offer numerous benefits, including improved accuracy, cost savings and remote connectivity. Consider the following features:
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