The Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) houses newborns who require intensive medical treatment. These are high-acuity units that often contain a mix of private rooms and pods. Regardless of the exact layout or types of room, one thing is virtually certain in NICUs: lots of visitor traffic.
Family members and hospital staff constantly enter and exit the NICU. This includes parents coming to visit their little loved ones, clinical engineers servicing equipment, neonatologists and nurses.
Given how susceptible NICU babies are to bacteria and viruses, infection control is top of mind for staff. Many departments have mandatory hand-wash stations or ‘scrub in’ stations to enforce hand hygiene.
But what about the phones and tablets that staff and visitors keep in their pockets while they wash their hands? This a challenge many NICUs have begun to address over the past year.
Placement & Protocol
The CleanSlate UV solution has been chosen by NICUs across the country to sanitize cell phones, tablets, and other personal items. As with any new piece of technology, location is a key variable.
Many NICUs have placed CleanSlate at the department entranceways, integrating UV phone disinfection into their existing hand washing or hand hygiene procedures. This is a prime location for CleanSlate UV because adding it to visitors’ hand hygiene protocol doesn’t actually add any additional time. The CleanSlate’s 20 second ultraviolet cycle syncs up perfectly with hand hygiene.
By asking all individuals entering the NICU – staff and parent alike – to sanitize their mobile devices while washing their hands, you can truly break the chain of infection and create a cleaner environment for patients.
Training & Engagement
No training is required to use the CleanSlate, making it ideal for public-facing environments. We often conduct in-services to provide nurses and doctors with an overview of the technology. They are the ones who will be asked about the CleanSlate and how it works by parents, so it’s helpful that they know how the unit works.
The CleanSlate’s tray allows multiple cell phones to be sanitized at the same time as long as 1 inch is left between devices. This is because UV light disinfects by line of sight. If the light cannot see the item, it cannot kill the germs on it.
By speaking to parents about the benefits of regularly washing their hands and sanitizing their devices, you’ll be demonstrating your facility’s commitment to safety. It is no surprise that facilities often see an increase in hand hygiene in units where the CleanSlate is in use.
To learn more about CleanSlate UV’s cell phone sanitizer and our hospital NICU case study visit www.cleanslateuv.com.
