Kelsey Hargreaves, Technical Manager at BICSc, reports.
In care homes, the home is normally judged by a plethora of things, the quality of the care given, the friendliness of the staff, the smell of the reception area, the cleanliness of the linen. When we think of risks to the residents inside, we often think of medical problems or care problems maybe even at a push, infection control. Now of course, in this article, I’m going to talk about cleaning, it may be unseen by the general public, but as we all know it is a key cog in the life-saving machine we call care. As with any cleaning, there are many unseen factors that contribute to the safety of the visitors and residents that are present in any healthcare environment, including a care home, in this article, I am going to briefly discuss my top 5 things to spot and fix!
Let’s start off with the invisible cost of ‘non-core’ duties. Cleaning operatives within care homes are responsible for far more than the core cleaning that they do. Depending on site policy, operatives can be responsible for bed changes (often more than one a day!), helping move residents, delivering of personal items, delivery and sometimes handling of meals, and sometimes even on-hand support for care staff. Aside from a productivity allowance that needs to be made for these tasks, we need to think not only of the time cost, but the cost this could cause in infection prevention and control. Every time a new task is added to the agenda, there is a chance of a bacteria transfer. Changing a bed in one patient room and cleaning the activity area in the next can pose a real threat if clean protocols are not in place or are not followed to 100% compliance.
Leading on from this, we must mention the shared responsibility model that care homes often work in, as is often the cause, we may see care staff wipe down touchpoints, activity staff tidy communal areas, and cleaning operatives complete scheduled routines. While this flexible approach keeps the home running and can sometimes aid good infection control prevention, it also introduces inconsistency.
When multiple people clean the same area, it becomes difficult to track
- Who cleaned what?
- Was the right equipment/chemical used?
- Was the correct time achieved?
- The real question, has cross‑contamination been prevented?
Where work is shared but communication lapses, there are risks of colleagues unknowingly undoing one another’s work by using incompatible products, wiping surfaces too soon, or re‑contaminating areas by not changing gloves or cloths. Shared responsibility works only when everyone is trained to the same standard and communicate with each other. Without strict process boundaries, microorganisms hitchhike silently from resident contact tasks to shared surfaces, equipment, and communal areas.
This then leads us on nicely to, number four, shared cleaning equipment. Mops, buckets, cloths, trolleys, and even chemicals are often passed informally from team to team. Problems arise when:
- Equipment isn’t colour‑coded correctly
- Chemicals intended for one area (e.g., bathrooms) are used in another (e.g., dining rooms)
- Departments use different dilution ratios (or have no idea about dilution!)
- No one is responsible for sanitising equipment between uses
Cross‑department product sharing also leads to errors like expired products being used, incompatible products being mixed, or essential chemicals running out mid‑shift. In care homes, these seemingly small issues can allow pathogens to spread unnoticed.
But perhaps the most significant hidden risk is the assumption that “anyone can clean”. In care homes, cleaning responsibilities often fall to care staff, night staff, kitchen staff, and activity teams. Without proper training, vital principles such as dwell time, cloth‑folding techniques, zoning, PPE use, and correct sequencing (clean to dirty, high to low) are missed.
Untrained cleaning is not just less effective – it can actively increase risk by spreading contamination rather than removing it. Care home cleaning is far more complex than routine housekeeping. The hidden risks – task switching, shared responsibilities, cross‑contamination, equipment sharing, and insufficient training – have real consequences for infection control. By recognising these factors and embedding structured cleaning practices, care homes can transform unseen weaknesses into strengths, ultimately protecting the residents who depend on them most.
https://www.bics.org.uk/
About the contributor
Kelsey Hargreaves
Technical Manager
BICSc