Working in the medical field in today’s setting requires extra caution. You need to ensure that everything you need for work is properly cleaned and sanitised to ensure no viruses or bacteria for you and your patients’ safety. One of the first and most pressing steps you need to do to maintain sanitised scrubs is to purchase your work uniform from trustworthy sources like Enurse Online. If you have high-quality scrubs, you can ensure that your outfit suits the strict medical industry standards.
Since scrubs are usually soiled or stained each time you go on duty, you must ensure that you clean them properly after every shift. Here are crucial steps to clean and disinfect your scrubs before returning to work.
Step 1: Separate Scrubs From Regular Laundry
You must always keep in mind that your scrubs are your work clothes. Since you work in a hospital, you can expect them to become extra dirty. So you need to segregate them from your other clothes and wash them separately.
As soon as your shift ends, you need to take off your scrubs and change into your regular clothes. It will ensure that you will not expose any virus or bacteria to the people you encounter on your way home. Place your used scrub in an airtight laundry bag before putting it in your bag. Once you arrive home, place your dirty scrubs in a separate hamper and avoid opening the sealed laundry bag until you are ready to wash them.
Step 2: Wash with Caution
Even if you are the one to do your laundry, you need to ensure that you practice safety measures to avoid exposure to viruses or bacteria. For example, if you are immunocompromised, you may put on your face mask and gloves for safer handling of your laundry.
Before loading your dirty scrubs on your washer, you must check first if there are any stains on the garment. You can put some drops of bleach or vinegar on blood stains or use a mixture of vinegar and water for coffee stains.
Once the stains are removed, you must turn your scrubs inside to avoid abrasions inside the washer. After completing your first wash, you need to inspect it again if there are stubborn stains remaining in the fabric. If you confirm that there are no more residues, you can go on with the second wash using hot water.
Step #3: Dry Using High Heat
Kill all the bacteria and viruses living in your scrubs by using the machine’s highest heat setting when tumble-drying your work clothes. Ideally, you need to put the scrubs inside the machine and let it run for at least 30 minutes.
Studies recommend heating objects for up to 20 minutes with temperatures more than 60°C (140°F) to ensure that you will remove harmful viruses like the dreaded COVID-19 from your scrubs. It would help if you also iron the scrubs first before putting them on to increase the chances of killing the virus.
Once your scrubs are properly cleaned and disinfected, you need to put them inside a clean plastic dry-cleaning bag and keep it sealed all the time. You may only take them out from your Enurse Online nursing bag once you are ready to change into your work clothes. By keeping the scrubs properly sanitised, you can guarantee that you will help curb the spread of any dreaded virus and diseases.
