BWFH continues to invest in technologies designed to keep patients, visitors and staff safe

In recent months, the Environmental Services Department at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital has been adhering to our Safe Care Commitment by ensuring that our physical environment is as clean and safe as possible, including cleaning hard surfaces, offices, patient rooms, common areas, bathrooms and break spaces, among others at a higher frequency.

To help better clean certain areas of the hospital that may contain harmful bacteria and pathogens, the hospital is now using two new systems to aid in their disinfecting efforts.

The first is the Surfacide® Helios Disinfection System, which is an automated system used in an unoccupied space to disinfect a variety of hard surfaces through UV-C exposure.

“This is a superior cleaning system that can completely disinfect a patient room in about 20 minutes,” states Mark Neill, MBA, CHESP, Director of Environmental Services and Central Transportation. “This allows our staff to focus on other areas of cleaning while having the confidence that we’re doing everything possible to keep our patients, visitors and staff safe.”

The system can be used to disinfect an entire room, a defined area within a room or to disinfect multiple pieces of equipment in a room. The Surfacide system is comprised of three UV-C emitters that are run off of a control tablet. When in use the three emitters rotate while taking laser measurements to determine the necessary energy needed to disinfect the space or object. To see the system in use, click here.

In addition, the hospital is also utilizing a new line of Clorox® products, including electrostatic sprayers that aid in the disinfecting and sanitization process throughout the hospital.

“The use of the electrostatic technology really allows for superior coverage in hard to reach places, such as underneath and behind surfaces,” says Ed Pitts, CHFM, CLSS-HC, Executive Director of Facilities and Support Service. “These new cleaning products give our staff the confidence to know that we’re invested in carrying out our Safe Care Commitment.”