Disinfectants: The role of standardised testing to aid selection. Part 2

Abstract

Choosing which disinfectant(s) to use in any particular healthcare environment is a far from trivial task and one that is undertaken by Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) professionals on a regular basis. The recent proliferation in the number and type of products designed to disinfect healthcare surfaces makes for a seemingly bewildering range of options. The primary factor to consider is whether the disinfectant is capable of killing the likely (but unknown) microbial challenge. For reusable non-invasive care equipment, standardised testing provides objective evidence for IPC teams. This second paper seeks to explain these tests and the conditions under which they are performed to aid in the IPC teams’ disinfection selection.