Following Safety and Compliance Procedures for Medical Cleaning
If you need a medical office cleaned, a regular commercial cleaner will not do the job. Instead, you need to hire a cleaner that is well-versed in the wide range of rules that must be followed. Medical cleaning is a highly specialized area that requires its own detailed set of procedures and policies.
Many of the compliance issues that a medical facility cleaner will face come from their role in helping prevent infections throughout the office. Other obligations center on the proper disposal of medical waste and bloodborne pathogens. Finally, the provider must maintain a safe environment for their own workers.
Accordingly, there are a number of government agencies that have rules that may impact medical cleaners. To name a few, there may be CDC, OSHA and EPA rules to track. The failure to know and understand these rules can have damaging impacts on your practice because you may be held responsible.
Medical Waste Disposal Requirements
When a health facility cleaner deals with medical waste, they cannot simply throw it in a trash can. Moreover, the cleaner may be assigned the task of disposing of your facility’s waste. State laws and regulations will give the standards for disposing of medical waste. If the cleaner is taking medical waste off-site to be incinerated, there are EPA rules about emissions standards for medical waste incinerators.
However, if the cleaner is not incinerating the medical waste, there are other treatment technologies that reduce how infectious the waste is. If you are using technology to treat medical waste, this will fall under EPA rules. In any event, the medical cleaner needs to have policies and procedures to both remove and dispose of the waste.
Dealing With Bloodborne Pathogens
Medical cleaners may come into contact with bloodborne pathogens when doing their job. These must be addressed based on OSHA rules. The medical office cleaner has a responsibility to make sure that the health care provider is in compliance with OSHA rules when it comes to workers’ exposure to these pathogens.
If they spot blood or other waste on floors or other surfaces, the medical cleaner simply cannot wipe it down with a paper towel. Instead, there are standards for how this is cleaned in accordance with federal government rules. The office cleaner must have a written plan for how they address blood spills or any other hazardous medical waste that they find on the job.
CDC Rules for Infection Control
Physicians must follow CDC rules for infection control. With regard to medical offices, this means that there is a different cleaning process than you would see in a commercial facility. Specifically, medical cleaners need to do terminal cleaning.
In order to comply with CDC rules, all touch points and surfaces need to be cleaned thoroughly according to written procedures. It also means that numerous things in the office that could come into contact with patients must be sterilized.
When it comes to medical cleaning, you cannot hire just anyone because you could risk breaking numerous federal and state rules.