Cleaning, Sanitizing & Disinfecting Your Facility - A Quick Guide

Protecting your patients from viruses and germs is important. Regular cleaning and disinfecting your facility can help you ensure this.

When it comes to carrying out facility management procedures, people often get confused with cleaners, sanitizers and surface disinfectants. By understanding the differences between these three, you will be able to know what products you should purchase and how to use them to keep your facility safe.

What is Cleaning?

Cleaning refers to removing dust particles from surfaces. However, it doesn’t mean that it actually kills germs. By removing contaminants, cleaning can reduce the risks of spreading infection to several folds.

Some cleaning experts believe that cleaning helps in removing 97 percent of germs. However, the remaining 3 percent of the germs continue reproducing and spreading diseases. If you want to remove those remaining germs, you need to go beyond cleaning i.e. using professional disinfectants and sanitizers.

What is Sanitizing?

Sanitization helps in removing germs, thus keeping the high-touch surfaces safe for people. After the sanitization process, about 99.9 percent of bacteria are removed. It involves killing bacteria by using chemicals.

What is Disinfecting?

Disinfecting helps in killing bacteria and viruses, such as coronavirus. It’s important to read the product label carefully when disinfecting surfaces. You should use multi-surface cleaners and disinfectants, which disinfect all at once, such as wipes and commercial disinfectants.

Health Canada has approved a list of disinfectants, which are supported by evidence to be effective against the coronavirus.

How to Clean Surfaces?

Cleaning involves removing germs from surfaces using soap and water. Before starting the process of cleaning, make sure you remove loose dust particles using a dry cloth. Then, use a high-quality cleaning agent, and clean the surface properly.

Different cleaning products have different directions for use. For some cleaners, you require to rinse the surface to remove any residue cleaner. So, make sure you follow them to get the best results.

When should you clean surfaces in your facility? The answer is when you see visible dust particles. You should always clean the surfaces before sanitizing or disinfecting. If you won’t clean the surfaces, germs may hide under the dust particles, thus increasing the risks of infection.

How to Sanitize Surfaces?

The process of sanitizing is simple. Just spray a sanitizer on the pre-cleaned surface, and remove the residue using a dry cloth.

Again, you should read the instructions on the label carefully. Let the sanitizer sit on the surface for the required dwell time and remove it using a microfiber cloth. It’s important to note that sanitizers are not as effective in removing germs as disinfectants; however, they have shorter dwell time.

Sanitizing is a great method to reduce the number of germs on high-touch surfaces, thus lowering the risks of common illnesses.

Sanitizers are effective in killing bacteria with up to 99.9 percent efficacy. It’s recommended to sanitize high-touch surfaces, such as desks, chairs, door knobs, computer keyboards, etc. regularly to ensure 100 percent disinfection.

How to Disinfect Surfaces?

There are two methods for disinfecting hard surfaces-

1. One-step disinfection process, and 

2. Two-step disinfection process

One-Step Disinfection Process

In this process, only one cleaner/surface disinfectant is used for cleaning and disinfection. It’s recommended for surfaces, which don’t look dirty. It’s necessary to read the product label carefully while using cleaners/disinfectants.

Two-Step Disinfection Process

In the two-step disinfection process, two different products are used for cleaning and disinfecting. It’s suggested for surfaces, which are visibly dirty.

In the first part, the cleaning agent is used to remove loose particles from the surfaces. Secondly, a disinfectant spray is applied to the surface. For complete action, it’s important to dwell surface disinfectant till the dwell time as per the instructions on the label.

What is Dwell Time?

Dwell time is the amount of time a multi surface cleaner and disinfectant should stay in contact with the surface in order to achieve a specific kill rate. Different professional cleaners and disinfectants are effective in removing different pathogens from different surfaces. To ensure desired pathogen control, it’s important to learn about the pathogens you should target and the dwell times.

What Type of Surfaces Can You Disinfect?

Usually, you should disinfect all the hard, non-porous surfaces in your facility daily. These include-

• Desks

• Phones

• Laptop/computer keyboards

• Counters

• Chairs

Final Thoughts

Regular cleaning should be your top priority to ensure safety of your facility visitors. For many, cleaning, sanitizing and disinfecting all are the same, but actually they are different processes.

Cleaning involves removing dust particles from surfaces. Sanitizing helps in removing 99.9 percent of germs, thus reducing the risks of infection.

Surface disinfectants and sanitizers are effective in killing germs. Before you use disinfectants, make sure you clean the surfaces, and leave them till their dwell times to achieve the best results. To ensure safety from harmful chemicals, buy eco-friendly disinfectants.