Upcoming Webinar to Focus on Global Hygiene Standards
The Textile Services Association (TSA-UK) is hosting a webinar on Thursday, April 27, at 2:15 p.m. CEST (8:15 a.m. EDT) titled “Building a Global Hygiene Protocol and Potential Future Challenges.” During the hour-long webinar, Professor Katie Laird from De Montfort University will present the results of a research project primarily funded by TRSA, TSA-UK and ETSA.
The research has the potential to allow the linen, uniform and facility services industry to optimize its processes while maintaining the balance between certified hygiene standards and improved options for sustainability. The webinar also will highlight how domestic (home) washing machines can’t be relied upon to properly disinfect healthcare garments such as scrubs during the wash process.
The webinar will include:
- A project overview of the five work packages from the initial scope of study
- Additional work packages, including coronavirus and temperature validation
- Domestic process validation, or lack thereof
- Implementation of the protocol into a “real-life” laundry operation
- Biofilms and pathogenic cross-resistance
- Validating various critical control points (CCPs) in a laundry process
- Referencing the new protocol into existing standards (mid- to long-term)
- Opportunities to introduce and validate chemo-thermal processes, especially for sporicidal disinfection
TSA-UK, in partnership with TRSA, ETSA and several other European associations set about creating a test protocol in 2019 to validate every laundry wash process. The need for such a protocol was evident from how different laundry operators used several different types of test methods that helped them interpret the results they wanted.
The industry identified the benefits of developing a single test method that measures microbial “kill” with the best possible results and practicality, with De Montfort University leading the academic research for the project. The National Associations are committed to working together to ensure that research findings are carefully introduced to address regional regulatory differences.
Click here to read the Disinfection Validation Research Report Summary.