Standards of Cleanliness
We are very proud of our standards of cleanliness throughout the Trust. Our hospitals work in close partnership with our professional cleaners ISS Mediclean Ltd who are contracted to carry out the domestic services to our required standards.
We base our standards on recommendations from the Department of Health and organisations with expertise in this area. We monitor and maintain our cleaners' performance through a detailed specification of works, constant quality assurance and audit visits and regular meetings to examine performance reports and discuss ways to continually improve the service.
Lowering risk through cleaning
Each area of our hospitals is assessed and given a risk category (ranging from very high to low). We then schedule the frequency of cleaning to match the risk factor, to make sure we concentrate our efforts in areas most likely to pose a risk. You can read our official document listing designated risk categories by area at the foot of this page.
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Minimum cleaning frequencies
Minimum cleaning frequencies are determined according to the risk category for each area. This means we set a minimum frequency for each task to be carried out within an area, as a guide, but these will be altered according to demand. You can read our official document on minimum cleaning frequencies at the foot of this document.
In addition to the routine daily cleaning we also have a rolling programme of deep cleans. This means that on at least one occasion each year every clinical area receives an additional clean when there are no patients present. This allows an even more thorough clean of the environment, including all fixtures and fittings, to be conducted.
Involving patients
We actively invite the views of patients and members of the public and we aim to involve patients and gain feedback on our performance in several ways. These include: comment cards, patient interviews and focus groups, patient surveys and via our PALS (patient advice and liaison) service.
Patient Environment Action Team (PEAT)
Patients are also represented in the annual PEAT assessment, which we are required to carry out by law. The inspection involves a team of people including hospital management staff, infection prevention and control staff, modern matrons as well as the patient representatives, looking at all aspects of our service through the eyes of a patient or visitor.
The assessment includes: cleanliness, catering, signage, car parking, security and general appearance and maintenance. In the 2008 assessment we achieved a rating of good for our environment (which includes cleanliness) and privacy and dignity and excellent for catering. Given the great age of many of our buildings and the associated problems we are very pleased with this rating.
Monitoring our progress
Our cleaning company carries out regular quality assurance checks. Four times a year we take the scores from these checks, our own formal monitoring and detailed managerial audits (where we carry out a more in-depth inspection of a specific area) to produce an overall cleanliness score by which we can judge our own performance.
For April to June 2008 we scored 93 per cent - our highest ever score which falls into the 'excellent' category.
Key facts on keeping our hospitals clean
Keeping two hospitals that are open 24-hours-a-day 365-days-a-year clean is an enormous task and uses considerable resources:
- We spend over £1,800,000 a year on keeping the hospitals clean.
- In all 130 employees spend a total of 3,800 hours a week cleaning.
- The total size of the cleaned areas is 61,590 square metres
- Over 3,500 litres of soap are used for hand washing each year along with an incredible 29,881,500 hand towels.
