Save Money & Time By Outsourcing Medical Cleaning

Hospital Cleaning & General Cleaning are NOT the Same Thing

There is so much more than ‘making sure things look clean’ that goes into any type of healthcare cleaning, especially now in the midst of a global pandemic. Not to discount a clean looking building but the primary goal of any effective medical cleaning service needs to be to take preventative action against Healthcare Acquired Infections (HAIs) and all infectious disease. Medical disinfection services can even add another layer of protection.

Addressing this problem successfully helps build trust and a good reputation among patients, families and friends and more importantly, helps safeguard their health. Regardless of how large or small your cleaning budget may be, those dollars are going to impact almost every aspect of your building. Your patients deserve to feel safe inside of health center, don’t settle for a hospital cleaning service that isn’t going to take it seriously.

Providing Healthcare Cleaning Services Requires Experience, Lots of it

It may seem like common sense, but not every cleaning service is equipped to handle the specific and unbending requirements of healthcare cleaning. Regardless of the type of facility, whether it be a hospital, surgical center, clinic, or an ambulatory center, you more than any other facility need a solid, experienced cleaning program. Medical disinfection services can offer an elevated level of clean.  Companies that take their work seriously and who have years of experience to back up their tried and true methods share a number of qualities in common:

• They care about who they put inside your facility. This means they take recruiting and screening seriously and have a robust training and certification program to back it up.
• An emphasis is placed on accountability and reliability. Their systematic and well thought out approach to management keeps people responsible and addresses problems proactively.
• They know your building as well as you do. This means a site inspection and building specific training to make sure your needs are well met.

On top of this, the company you partner with should be an experienced medical industry professional. The distinction between general and medical cleaning is important, having a company that knows what they’re doing can literally mean life or death for your patients. Not just anyone can provide medical disinfection services that offer the peace of mind we need right now as we get back to work.

Outsourcing to a Professional Medical Cleaning Company is Advantageous

On many occasions we have seen Facility Managers give up on finding an industry professional and turn to in-house cleaning as a solution. After all, how hard could running a medical cleaning service be? Very hard is the answer. It is the job of any cleaning service to make sure a building runs smoothly and that said building is well taken care of regardless of what comes up. Unless your in-house cleaning service happens to have years of healthcare cleaning experience and enough money to back all the required equipment, chemical solutions and training your going to get the opposite of smooth. It doesn’t even present a significant financial advantage to you in any case.

One of the main reasons to outsource is to help reduce costs, minimize how many problems you have to be involved in and to help shield you from third party litigation. Beyond the savings outsourcing offers, having a seasoned company backing you is going to improve your patients’ safety, customer service, HCAHPS scores and your infection control along with carefully observing your industry relevant industry regulations. And right now, during the global pandemic, people appreciate assurances that the spaces they move about in are truly clean.

Cost Should Never be Your Only Focus

Outsourcing will probably save you money, especially if you manage a large medical center, but this isn’t the primary reason to consider it. If your ‘cost-saving measures’ are cutting into your service that you need a new solution. In a medical environment the primary goal always needs to be protecting patients and creating a healthy, well-maintained environment. If your cleaning company can’t handle both then they aren’t cut out for healthcare cleaning. Knowing how to provide a quality service for a reasonable price in the hospital cleaning business requires years of experience and a commitment to constantly improving and innovating. Your industry veterans are never going to be the cheapest, but they know how to do their job correctly while still providing you with real value.

Companies Vary, but the Cream of the Crop have the Same Traits in Common

There are some specifics that set healthcare cleaning companies apart from the rest of the marketplace. Each company is a little different and specialty services will vary widely across companies of different areas and sizes, but they will almost always look the same in these regards.

• Regulatory practices: Every professional medical cleaning will be up to date on compliance training for OSHA, HIPPA and Bloodborne pathogens. This means the correct training and a detailed understanding of what regulations apply to each facility and how they need to be observed. Many of these companies will take the extra step and align their practices with industry best practices outlined by the CIMS certification. Likewise, with covid-19, medical cleaning companies should also be up to date on the ever changing requirements.
• Proper Chemical Usage: The chemicals used to clean the facility must be properly stored and used. This means an intimate knowledge of disinfecting strategies and an understanding of which chemical solutions are effective for which jobs. For instance, using EPA approved spore killing disinfectant agents as necessary and using EPA approved chemicals to target covid-19.
• People Practices: Companies that know what they are doing go out of their way to train and back their most important resource, their staff. This means lower than average employee turnover, competitive pay and benefits, solid screening, training and management techniques and of course regular inspections to make sure that everything is running smoothly.
• Experience: Any healthcare cleaning service worth its salt needs to have a lot of documented work experience on other accounts. If they aren’t prepared to do the work, you are going to run into problems.

Partnering with the Right Industry Professional for the Job

With a large janitorial marketplace, it will always be challenging to find a medical cleaning service that does the right job for the right price. You, like many other Facility Managers out there, are likely wondering where a good place to start might be. How many companies that offer such a service exist out there and how long might it take to find them?

Here at Stathakis, we work with businesses in South Eastern Michigan to help give you an affordable, quality cleaning plan that is custom fit to your facility. You deserve to have a reliable medical cleaning service, medical disinfection services and your patients deserve to have a clean, well-maintained medical building.