Have Your Medical Cleaning Services Flat Lined?

Has your Medical cleaning company flat lined? Or is your medical cleaning service just offering useless panaceas? Or perhaps your Medical janitorial services were DOA from the beginning. Did your Medical office cleaning show promise but eventually settle into a pattern of mediocrity? It can be challenging as a Facility Manager because medical cleaning is so critical—from patient health to attracting and retaining top talent to HCAHPS scores—yet finding a capable, competent and consistent healthcare cleaning isn’t so easy. While there is no shortage of commercial cleaning companies willing to TAKE your business, when you examine your choices, janitorial services companies that will actually deliver the service you need at a value are in short supply. Are your patient rooms dingy? Are your facility restrooms a turn off? Are unkempt lobby areas sending the wrong message? Is a lack of facility maintenance lowering your HCAHPS scores? Are complaints on the rise and revenue in decline? Are missed tasks the norm and quality assurance absent? If your health care cleaning services have flat lined, it is time to move on. You contracted with a medical cleaning company to run your facility better and make managing your hospital cleaning and medical office cleaning easier not more challenging.

Why Healthcare Cleaning Matter So Much

Cleaning a medical facility or medical offices isn’t like general office cleaning at all. Medical office cleaning and healthcare cleaning require a real understanding of cleaning for health. Additionally, healthcare cleaning requires an understanding and adherence to a variety of complex compliance issues. You need a janitorial services company that understands the complex and varied requirements of medical cleaning. The best medical cleaning companies understand how the work they do to maintain your facility contributes to HCAHPS scores. And any commercial cleaning company that wants to attract and retain healthcare cleaning customers should have in place a detailed and observable training system for both general office cleaning, medical office cleaning, hospital cleaning and other salient training like OSHA, HIPPA, & Blood borne Pathogens. Anything less from your medical office cleaning is a poor and incomplete treatment plan.

Why Some Medical Cleaning Companies Are Dead On Arrival

Medical cleaning, like any other industry, has companies that simply will not or cannot meet your needs. Some medical office cleaning companies want to deliver but simply do not have systems and practices in place to assure consistent, responsive medical cleaning. It could be that they are poorly managed or simply inexperienced with regard to health care cleaning but hire less than consistent medical cleaning companies and your health care cleaning is stripped of most if not all of the benefits of outsourcing your medical cleaning services. What are these subpar medical cleaning companies doing or not doing that impedes quality healthcare cleaning?

• They are missing the necessary formal quality assurance programs, so managing the onsite cleaners all too often falls to you.
• They fail to grasp the often-complex compliance issues, all too often missing the documented safety measures that leave you open to compliance issues.
• They do not have an effective, consistent, systemized method for attracting, hiring and vetting very good employees.
• They lack the comprehensive training programs needed to keep patients and staff safe and deliver the quality services you need in a healthcare facility.
• They often have a lack of clear janitorial pricing making it difficult to compare providers to determine value. Additionally, their inexperience in pricing their medical cleaning services means more nuisance for you in getting them to do the work they promised or challenging hidden charges and attempts at upselling you.

And beyond a lack of solid systems and procedures, many janitorial companies take dangerous shortcuts. From undocumented workers to illegal subcontracting, some commercial cleaning companies have no problem putting you, your facility and your reputation as risk.

Some Medical Office Cleaning Services Have the Right Prescription

While there are some medical office cleaning companies that are positively frightening in their lack of professionalism and quality services, there are some medical office cleaning companies that have a prescription for success. First, let’s define success when it comes to a medical cleaning company. The best medical cleaning services:

• Attract and retain very good people that are trained to succeed in the challenging medical cleaning environment
• Have significantly lower than average janitorial turnover.
• Offer clear janitorial pricing making it easy to understand and compare medical cleaning quotes.
• Take the time to understand what YOU need and customize services around your facility.
• Work with you to assure compliance across the board.
• Make use of quality assurance measures to create reliability through accountability.
• Have a clear, responsive point person to assure responsive, effective service.
• Educate themselves about the specific requirements and compliance issues with regard to health care cleaning BEFORE they get the business.

The best medical office cleaning services do all of this and more. The best healthcare cleaning services systemize nearly every area of their business in order to assure they have everything in place to deliver quality, responsive janitorial services delivered consistently at a true value.

Finding a Medical Cleaning Specialist

So great, some medical cleaning services have the right prescription for effective medical cleaning but how do you find one you might wonder. The easiest and most effective way to find high performing medical office cleaning companies that will offer the right balance of quality and value is to use industry certification to develop your short list. Much like physicians have board certification to certify a level of experience and expertise, the cleaning industry has the ISSA or International Sanitary Supply Association, to certify certain medical cleaning companies as more experienced with a documented high level of adherence to agreed upon industry best practices. This certification is called CIMS or Certified Industry Management Standard and is a valuable tool for finding the right medical office cleaning companies for your facility. The Cleaning Industry Management Standard offers professional certification that translates directly into better service for you and your healthcare facility be it a hospital, ambulatory center, surgical center, clinic or medical offices.

Of course, the ISSA’s CIMS isn’t a cure all but it offers a valuable shortcut to eliminate those janitorial services companies that are simply unprepared for the true requirements of medical cleaning. To make CIMS work best for you and your facility, develop a short list of CIMS certified medical cleaning company in your area. Then, do your homework and look at which individual company is going to be the best fit for you. Meet with them and get a sense of fit. Any of the CIMS certified companies will be capable of delivering a high level of professional, responsive, consistent janitorial service, now you just pick the contractor that is the best fit for you and your facility. To find an ISSA CIMS-GB janitorial services contractor in your area, visit the ISSA here.