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Like any medical clinic, your veterinary practice is a place where you turn health problems and crises into healing and recovery.
K eeping the clinic, exam rooms, and public areas clean can often be more challenging than with a doctor's office. Sick or injured animals may urinate, bring in unwanted dirt and debris, or leave fur all over the office. While you love them, you also want to protect yourselves, the clients, and the animals.
How can you boost cleanliness at your veterinary clinic? Here are 5 tips any veterinarian can use.
Hire a Service
Your staff members are trained and professional animal caregivers, but they probably aren't professional cleaners. For the best result s , hire an outside service at least once per week to give your clinic a proper sanitization and cleaning.
Look for companies with experience in medical or dental clinics as well as veterinary settings. In addition to regular disinfecting, you may also want to have them perform monthly and quarterly deep cleans in different areas.
Write a Checklist
Clean ing up the office may seem like an obvious request that's easy to follow, but do you have established practices for doing cleaning tasks? Are they written and posted so that everyone can see and follow them?
Create written instructions for vital tasks such as disinfecting exam rooms and operating rooms before and after use, handwashing and tool sanitization, and thorough cleaning of kennels. Go over the instructions with all employees and post them in easy to spot locations .
Checklists are a valuable tool even if they seem like overkill. You may want to prepare an opening and closing checklist , as well as checklists for cleaning rooms after patient use. Have employees initial tasks as they complete them.
Add Ventilation
Concentrating on the floors and surfaces in the office may cause you to forget about the invisible cleaning aids in your office. One of these is the ventilation system .
Veterinary practices sometimes develop an odor due to an animal ’ s condition , and clients may notice this as soon as they enter the reception area. Circulati ng air properly out of the exam rooms , bathrooms, and kennels helps prevent germs from settling and causing odors .
Work with an experienced ventilation service to determine how best to filter and recirculate air in these key areas. Air from certain rooms, such as the kennels or any isolation wards, should not mix with the rest of the clinic's circulation.
Remove Clutter
The less items you have on the floors and along walls, the fewer places dust and debris will accumulate. Removing unnecessary clutter helps the cleaning service be thorough and makes emergency cleanups easier for your staff.
Many practice s can cut down on clutter in a few ways. One is by working to digitize records and paperwork with electronic documentation, cloud storage services, and online portals for patients. Digitizing paperwork reduces piles of papers, client files, and clutter on desks.
In addition, do a thorough spring cleaning at least once per year and consider storing unused equipment or documentation at a safe location offsite.
Choose Good Products
Make sure you choose high qu ality disinfecting products and teach everyone how to use them properly.
For example, you should dilute many products. However , d iluting them too much makes them less effective as a sanitizer and diluting them too little can cause skin damage or inhalation risk s for both humans and animals.
Work with your cleaning service to determine effective alternatives to harsh chemicals and animal-friendly varieties where chemicals are necessary.
To get your veterinary clinic on the road to thorough cleanliness and sanitation, contact us at Ariel Janitorial Services, Inc. With experience in all commercial and medical settings, we can help you create both internal controls and a cleaning routine that will protect the health of you, your patients, and their owners.
