Complete decontamination strategy for Midlands Trust

Gillian Hill, Clinical Services director of iM Med, the decontamination specialist, discusses the importance of a strategic approach to continuous best practice. This is demonstrated by recent work for University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire (UHCW) NHS Trust which, following positive experiences of iM Med’s service and maintenance support, implemented a complete decontamination strategy – equipment, project management, technical services, compliance training, and consumables.

With the ever-changing landscape of patient numbers, regulatory requirements, and best practice recommendations, Trusts and decontamination departments continually face new challenges and pressures to deliver effective, good quality services to patients. Ensuring compliance is a top priority, and patient safety is paramount, but this cannot be done in isolation. The focus has to be across the entire decontamination journey of the endoscope, which means looking at a complete decontamination strategy.

The BSG 2020 guidance on the decontamination of endoscopes sets out a range of expert leadership, control, and recommendations to ensure that patient safety is always met. In summary, the guidance focuses on the need for: