Keeping Healthcare Pest-Free: Essential Control Measures

Managing hospitals, long-term care facilities, emergency medical care centers, physical or mental rehabilitation facilities, health facilities experts have numerous difficulties making sure they satisfy the highest degree of sanitation while serving sensitive populations. 

One of these difficulties is keeping the facility pest-free. Pests transfer germs and contaminate surfaces, medical supplies, and tools, posing a variety of health hazards. 

As a facility grows in size, larger kitchens, more food being served, more bathrooms, and more guests, among other factors, define the risk factors for pest infestations. Other elements include the state of the people kept inside the institutions and the organizational complexity of decision-makers. 

Understanding how pests get access, what pests are most troublesome, where infestations are most likely to grow, and how to stop them with the help of a Manchester pest control company will help one avoid a pest problem.

Causes of Pests in Health Care Facilities

From within the building or via the goods brought in by workers and guests—such as food and clothing—pests find their way into healthcare facilities. Pests move indoors during winter. Rodents come in through loading dock doors, utility openings, or vegetation like trees and shrubs next to the structure. 

Leaking pipes provide an entrance point and attract flies, cockroaches, or other pests drawn to extra moisture. Unscreened food deliveries provide another simple access point for insects. If the cardboard boxes the deliveries come in are not disposed of correctly, they offer cover for insects. Pests, including bed bugs, can be brought in by clothing, bags, and purses; laundry collecting can help distribute them. 

Tips for health facilities professionals

Every level of health care staff member and every area of the institution must be part of a successful pest control campaign. Some often-used advice is: 

• Search and eradicate sources of moisture in several plumbing sections, including blocked drains and leaking pipes.
• Especially in kitchens and cafeterias, keep food packed and stored correctly.
• Clean high-traffic areas like kitchens and public dining rooms, where the daily buildup of food waste and rubbish is more likely. 
• Sort trash often and keep it in dumpsters or sealed containers. 
• Check food delivery boxes before they go into the kitchen. 
• Keep ventilated, dry storage spaces. 
• Seal holes and gaps on the building’s outside, especially pipe and utility entrance points. 
• Fix crumbling outside wood on buildings since some insects find attraction in such material. 
• Fix loose mortar around the foundation and lower-level windows and replace weather stripping. 
• Search undisturbed areas—including closets and storage spaces—for rodent droppings.
• Keep any vegetation—including trees, shrubs, and plants—trimmed or removed at least two feet apart from the buildings. 
• Look for any routine kitchen drain obstructions under such equipment as refrigerators and freezers. 
• Make sure none of the doors—especially those on loading docks—are ever propped open. 
• Replace fluorescent lights, which attract flying insects, with sodium vapor lamps all around the facility’s immediate outside. If fluorescent lights are utilized, they should be positioned at least 100 feet apart from structures.

Proactive pest control

Pest control and management cannot be considered unrelated to the general safety and hygiene of medical facilities. Instead, they must be seen as absolutely vital to achieving these objectives. 

Establishing a good professional pest management program is an investment in the health of staff members and patients and in preserving a good public reputation. 

Because of the proactive preventive actions taken in a professional pest management program, the advantages usually exceed any related expenses and, over time, may save the facility precious money.

Conclusion

Health facilities can engage in several actions, which generally include appropriate infrastructure maintenance, provision of physical barriers, having a pest control plan, and involving a pest control agency to guarantee pest—and animal-free surroundings.