As facilities managers take more responsibility for the hospital laundries, Murray Simpson, chief executive of the TSA (Textile Services Association), the trade association for the laundry, dry cleaning, and textile rental industries in the UK, highlights the major issues that need to be addressed – ranging from effective stock control, to making sure nurses’ uniforms are washed at sufficiently high temperatures to prevent them harbouring bacteria, to ensure that Government targets on hygiene and efficiency are met.
As well as delivering arguably the best healthcare services in the world (according to the Commonwealth Fund), the NHS is an economic sector all of its own within UK plc. Like all economic sectors, there are myriad support functions as well, many of which are now outsourced to external service providers – but there is one that is often overlooked when the statistics about the NHS are scrutinised: laundry.
There are around 2,300 NHS hospitals in England alone, but less than half of them will be running their own laundries. The majority of hospital laundries are now outsourced – often via the facilities management companies contracted to provide built fabric or soft services support – and these laundries wash anything and everything – from sheets, pillow cases, and varieties of linen products, to workwear.
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