Infection Prevention and Control Guide for Janitorial Personnel

The spread of microorganisms in any facility may contribute to employees or clients’ sickness, absenteeism, loss of productivity and damage to company’s image and reputation. Therefore, ensuring that the environment is properly cleaned is cost effective for any organization. Although proper cleaning and disinfection is considered to play such a major role in combating the spread of infectious diseases, the front-line workers charged with this responsibility are often limited in their education and training on infection control. Given the expectation of their role, it makes sense to continuously provide education and training to environmental service workers so that they can better appreciate how their duties contribute to workplace wellness and safety. Such trainings require that environmental service workers be knowledgeable about basic community and healthcare infectious diseases, risks, exposure controls and how their contribution in cleaning and disinfection breaks the chain of transmission. This infection control guide is therefore relevant for persons cleaning both healthcare and non-healthcare facilities.