In this hospital, cleaning services were outsourced. According to the contract and the cleaning and disinfection standard operating protocol (SOP), during terminal disinfection, the housekeeping staff applied a chlorine-based detergent, Antisapril Detergent %, Angelini, followed by a chlorine-based disinfectant (Deornet Clor (COSÌ, Forlì-Cesena, Italy), active chlorine mgr/L) on furniture surfaces and electromedical devices.

Among the appliable strategies for the improvement of cleaning and disinfection practices are the use of new materials and/or disinfectants, the training and audit of operators, and the use of new automated technologies, which are becoming increasingly important. In particular, no-touch disinfection technologies have the great advantage of not being dependent on the operator, ensuring process repeatability. Furthermore, their effectiveness has been demonstrated even on sites that are difficult to reach with manual intervention. Their use complements but does not replace ordinary cleaning and disinfection protocols. In the past few years, ultraviolet disinfection systems have been widely investigated and used as a way to improve standard cleaning protocols. Currently, ultraviolet devices are automated in order to guarantee process repeatability and reduce human errors. The application of UV devices as an addition to traditional environmental cleaning has become increasingly common due to their effectiveness in reducing the environmental microbial burden in a shorter time compared to other technologies using chemical products [

Improving the cleaning and disinfection of high-touch surfaces is one of the core components of reducing healthcare-associated infections. The effectiveness of an enhanced protocol applying UV-C irradiation for terminal room disinfection between two successive patients was evaluated. Twenty high-touch surfaces in different critical areas were sampled according to ISO -, both immediately pre- and post-cleaning and disinfection standard operating protocol (SOP) and after UV-C disinfection ( sampling sites in each condition, in total). Dosimeters were applied at the sites to assess the dose emitted. A total of .% (/) of the sampling sites tested after SOP were positive, whereas only .% (/) were positive after UV-C. According to the national hygienic standards for health-care setting, .% (/) resulted in being non-compliant after SOP and only .% (/) were non-compliant after UV-C disinfection. Operation theaters was the setting that resulted in being less compliant with the standard limit (&#x; colony-forming unit/ cm

The role of the environment, particularly of high-touch surfaces in the patient&#x;s room (e.g., bedrails, over-bed tables, and call-buttons) and reusable care equipment that is moved between rooms, has been demonstrated to be fundamental in the transmission of healthcare-related infections. Together with standard precautions and the application of good practices in invasive procedures, environmental cleaning and disinfection represents one of the three pillars of infection risk prevention in healthcare settings.

In our study, we evaluated the efficacy of the UV-C treatment only on the reduction in mesophilic growth that mainly represents human contamination, but not on specific pathogens of interest; however, the reduction was very significant, suggesting that this system can easily eliminate pathogens as well. We have previously demonstrated that the adoption of an automated UV-C-disinfection robot in the enhancement of SOP in high-risk settings was successful in reducing pathogens on high-touch surfaces, improving the patient&#x;s safety [