HOME HEALTH GUIDE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 80, 1 December 1945, Page 4

HOME HEALTH GUIDE

ROOM DISINFECTION * (By the Department of Health.) After nursing any case of infectious disease in the home, ther e is often doubt as to the proper way to disinfect the sick room after recovery, before it is put into general use by the family again. Sheets, pillowslips, mattress covers and other washable articles except blankets should be steeped in a reliable disinfectant solution for at least one hour, then washed and boiled. Blankets and mackintosh sheets require four hours soaking in disinfectant, then washing. Care should be taken to dilute disinfectants to the exact strength required. Any utensils, vessels or crockery used by the patient should be sterilised by boiling in water for five minutes.

Where the mattress ticking is clean after the mattress cover is removed, thorough airing and exposure to sunlight is all that is necessary. Should the ticking become soiled with discharge, a hospital makes it safe again by exposure to saturated steam in a proper steam disinfector: or removes the contents, boils the ticking for twenty minutes and refills same with clean filling. A private home would probably find a new mattress the easier way out. Furniture, ornaments, pictures, painted and varnished woodwork etc., should be wiped over with a wet cloth, and walls cleaned with a broom covered with a damp cloth. No dry dusting should be done. Loose floor coverings should be removed and the floor scrubbed with soap, soda or other washing powder and hot water. The rugs or carpets should be sponged over and put out to air in the sun. The windows and doors of the room should be left wide open to let in as much air and sunlight as possible. This procedure is all that is required in disinfecting a room after some septic or communicable disease. Fumigation or disinfectant sprays can be used if desired, but there’s no real need for these procedures. If everything the patient handled and touched is either disinfected or boiled or washed and sunned, and the room is spring-cleaned in the way outlined, and thoroughly aired, there’ll be little danger of any spread of infection from subsequent use of that room. (Cut this out; you may need it)